[Sca-cooks] OT/OOP Kvass Recipe

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

"KVASS

"A very refreshing Russian beverage which is made in many Russian households about once a week.

" 'With eight quarts water take 1 1/2 lbs. malt, 1 lb. rye flour, 1 1/2 lbs. sugar, 1/8 of a lb. mint leaves, half pepper pod, and half cake of yeast. Mix the malt and flour with boiling water and make a thick dough. Put into barely warm oven and leave for the night.

" ' Next day dilute dough with eight quarts boiling water and pour into a wooden tub. Let stand for 12 hours, then pass through a cloth. Pour one quart into an enamel saucepan, put on fire, add 1 1/2 lb. sugar and an infusion made with the mint leaves (resembling weak tea). Boil once, then take off fire, cool until just warm, and add the yeast previously diluted with one cup of this same warm liquid. Let stand in a warm place until it begins to ferment; then pour into the rest of the kvass in the wooden tub, and let it stand until bubbles appear. Prepare clean bottles, putting one malaga raisin into each; pour in the kvass, cork the bottles, tie the corks with string to the neck of the bottles, and keep in a warm place for a day or two. Then put in a cold cellar.' --R.C.B." 

I can't find R.C.B. [Russian Cookery Book? -- just a guess] listed in the bibliographical source appendix, but this is published in Andre L. Simon's "Concise Encyclopedia Of Gastronomy", Harcourt, Brace, New York, 1952, ISBN 0-87951-134-6

My recollection of actually making this stuff was that we had a couple bottles explode, and it was really, really good at about two weeks old, then dropped in quality fairly rapidly.

On the other hand, it's a really good recipe to start with if you're playing around with infusion mashes and just wrapping your head around the concept of throwing boiling water over grains, which many people assume won't work or will destroy the grain. Which it can, but this assumes that "no thermometer = uncontrolled, random conditions," which is not necessarily a valid assumption.

Adamantius






"Most men worry about their own bellies, and other people's souls, when we all ought to worry about our own souls, and other people's bellies."
			-- Rabbi Israel Salanter