Efficient Tempeh Making

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Efficient Tempeh Making

• with Manfred
• 5/6/2012
• http//www.soe.ucsc.edu/manfred/tempeh/
• Manfred s homepage

Printout (4 slides per page)
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My Goal

• Develop methods for growing Tempeh that are as
  easy as canning
• Find superior strains of Tempeh and other molds

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Why Tempeh?

• High protein - poor or healthy mans meat
• Easy to digest
• Makes soybeans palatable
• Grow tasty food instead of feeding beans to
  cowshhh

What is it ?

• Mycelia of Rhizopus oligosporus
• Beneficial common bread mold
• filamentous fungus

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Remove protective husksby cracking beans

• Simple hand mill for grinding wheat and corn
• Electric grain mills when set loose enough might
  rub against housing
• Just split beans. Gap must be wide enough. No
  grinding
• 1.5 pounds / 3 3/4 cups for 5
  liter/quart pot

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Blow off husks

• With your breath or fan or hair dryer
• Wet de-husking of beans is a pain

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Soaking

• At least 4 hours
• Drain for 5 min

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Pressure cook

• Drained beans plus
• 1/4 cup water
• 5 1/2 Table sp vinegar
• 1 cup of dry millet or rice
• Mix and bring to full pressure
• Reduce heat so pot barely keeps full pressure and
  no steam lost
• Cook for 15 min at full pressure
• Or until al dente
• Cool pot till pressure is zero by running cold
  water over it
• Cool beans to body temperature
• Let close pot sit for 6 h
• Partially submerse closed pot in cold water for
  1/2 h

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Inoculation

• Drain in colander if necessary
• Ideally no liquid left and no burning
• Lower or increase added water
• next time if need be
• Keep records
• Transfer to large mixing bowl
• Add 1/2 teaspoon of spores
• Beans must be at body temperature
• Mix for 3 min w. spatula
• Move beans off side of bowl with spatula
• Break clumps - thorough mixing is crucial!
• No dirty fingers

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Fill into pan

• Spread evenly
• 1 in / 2.5 cm thick
• Compact slightly
• Keep clean

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Incubation

• Aquarium heater thermostat set
  to 86F / 30C
• Calibrate temperature of heater with thermometer
  if necessary
• Incubate at ambient temperature in Indonesia or
  Hawaii

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Incubation 2

• Float pan in tub on
• 3 in / 7.5cm of water
• Let it breathe Crack open lid with cord and chop
  stick at opposite corners
• Cover with sleeping bag unless temperature close
  to 86 F / 30 C
• Tempeh produces its own heat at end of incubation
  period and might over heat

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Ready for cooking

• 24 hours
• 28 hours
• more flavor
• harmless black spores

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Flip pan onto cutting board

• Cut the bounty
• Store in fridge in zip lock bags for a week
• Oxygen encourages sporulation
• Or in freezer

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Sandwiches

• Cut with bread slicer
• Toast till it starts to brown
• Add mustard, horse radish, sauerkraut, .
• Lots of tasty Indonesian recipes
• Tempeh LaLa

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Ingredients tools

• 5 quart / liter pressure cooker
• Hair dryer, mixing bowl, colander, spatula
• Baking sheet size pan
• about 1 x 1.5 feet - 30 x 45 cm
• 2 in / 5 cm deep
• I prefer stainless steel equipment
• Beans, grains, spores, vinegar
• Use organic soybeans
• Plastic container slightly larger than pan
• about 6 in / 15 cm deep with lid

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Tools continued

• Submersible aquarium heater with high accuracy
  thermostat
• Mine is from Visi-Therm (150 Watt) Accurate
  within 1 F / 1/2 C
• If less accurate then you need a dark room
  thermometer for calibration

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Needs of the mold

• Beans or grain
• Oxygen - avoid waterlogged substrate
• High humidity
• Right temperature range
• High 89.5 F / 32 C 20-30 h
• Medium 86 F / 30 C 24-34 h BEST
• Low 82.5 F / 28 C 28-48 h
• Ripen to personal taste !

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More rough numbers

• 2 3/4 Table sp vinegar 1/4 teaspoon of spores
  per pound of dry substrate
• 20 dry small grain

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Contamination

• At high temperatures Natto invades easily
• Slimy texture
• Vinegar provides some protection
• Cake should be firm and have earthy smell
• Mycelia should grow into bean
• Compare to store bought Tempeh
• Show to experienced grower

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Advantages of my method

• Dry de-hulling
• Pressure cooking
• No draining and drying of cooked beans
• Addition of small grain
• soaks up remaining moisture
• nutty flavor
• less spores
• Simple incubator
• 100 humidity
• Prevents overheating of substrate
• Cheap, save, compact, quiet
• Easy to sterilize entire incubator
• w. dish soap, alcohol, or chlorine
• Use for yoghurt, yeast dough and chicken?

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Choices

• Tempeh Rhizopus oligosporus mold
• black spores 85 F / 30 C, 24 - 36 h
• Onchom Neurospora intermedia mold
• orange spores 82 F / 28 C, 48 h
• slower growth, trickier to grow
• Natto Bacillus subtilis bacterium
• 104 F / 40 C, 20 - 24 h
• aquarium heater usually not that high
• indestructible
• discovered by the horse of samurai Yoshiie
  Minamoto

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Links

• Pdf file of this document (4 slides per page)
• My old method
• Good link on Tempeh
• Hand grain mill - Ebay 15-3015 shipping
• Stainless steel pressure cooker 30 - 60
• primitive cookers with bell loose too much water

S
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Thanks

• Ellen Baker
• First learned from her
• John Andberg
• Helped me test my methods
• Gunter Pfaff and Betsy Shipley
• I scaled down and modified their industrial
  incubator
• William Shurtlett Aoyagi Akiko
• Inspiring books
• Researchers Keith Steinkraus, Barry Bowman

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Wish List

• Commercially available onchom spores
• Tempeh mold with white spores
• Mixed spore formulation w. variety of tempeh and
  onchom strains
• Save vitamin B12 producing bacteria that can be
  grown w. tempeh