We've had so many excellent Portland Fermentation Festivals in our nine-year run but this year's, just last week at Ecotrust, was one of my all-time favorites. There was a lot that made this year stand out, including the fact that we had our extra-special guests of honor from Kombucha Ship and Kitchen Nippon travel all the way from Tokyo to Portland this year for our festival!
This year's festival Panel of Experts theme was Japanese ferments and included Kaoru Shibata and Machiko Tateno of Kitchen Nippon, Yuji Shimada from Kombucha Ship and festival co-organizer Heidi Nestler of Portland's Wanpaku Natto. Thank you so much to Travel Portland's Jeff Hammerly and Yoko Furukawa for translating the panel! I really enjoyed moderating it.
My friend Phoenix Rath made us super cute Japan flag lapel pins, photographed below, in celebration of our Japanese guests of honor, and she also made us Shrinky Dinks pickle pins. She and other friends have made us these cute ferment fest pins for the past few years’ festivals. I was lucky enough to get to bring some of them with me to Tokyo's Fermentation Future Forum in the spring that they made.
Another festival standout this year includes our first ever (and definitely annual now!) Fermentation Station, organized by festival co-organizer Claudia Lucero of Urban Cheesecraft. At the Fermenation Station, festival attendees got try their hand at making their very own veggie ferment that they then got to take home with them to ferment. So sweet. All of the veggies and salt were so very kindly donated by People's Food Co-op. Thank you People's!
And, we had our youngest exhibitor to date this year -- 11-year-old Kylie! Kylie and her mom are two of my very best friends. Kylie was our boss this year and we helped her make and sample her very own home-fermented root beer. She even worked on a collaboration grapefruit soda for Nat West of Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider. Photos below.
I love that we had yet another sun-shined-upon festival day and night. Strangely enough, even though our Portland festival is always set in the rainy fall, we have always had beautiful weather for it. That makes the rooftop of Ecotrust all the more magical on festival night. On the rooftop, during this year’s festival, we had music from DJ Jimbo (check out his festival playlist here), cider from Reverend Nat's Hard Cider and food from Obon. What a dream.
Thank you to everyone who came out for our ninth annual STINKFEST and made it so special and fun! There were nearly 500 of you! Stinkfest is our loving nickname for the festival since all of those open, ferment-filled crocks and ferment samples can get pretty stinky on festival night. In a good way!
We are incredibly grateful to everyone who makes our festival so fantastic year after year, including our host with the very most, Ecotrust. We couldn't do it without them. I love, love, love Ecotrust and their non-profit mission. Others who make our festival thrive year after year include our exhibitors, demo'rs, attendees, rooftop vendors, volunteers and local media folks who always help us to get the word out.
If you didn't check out any of the festival coverage this year, I highly recommend this longer clip as well as this shorter clip from KGW with Cassidy Quinn featuring our 2018 Stinkfest. This Portland Tribune article is great too. We also had good coverage from Portland Monthly, Willamette Week, Portland Mercury and others. We are so grateful for all of this solid support year after year.
In terms of social media, we have our festival Facebook and Twitter accounts if you want to see more, and/or post something. On social media please consider adding the hashtag #portlandfermentationfestival to your festival photos. We’d love to see them.
And, once more, here’s a reminder of why we do what we do from our 2018 press release: At a time in Portland when it feels like just about everything is undergoing or has recently undergone great change, it's nice to have some things that remain the same year after year. Thank you, Portland Fermentation Festival. No big changes, same old STINKFEST! // The Portland Fermentation Festival is, and always has been, a non-commercial event. Once you purchase your ticket and enter the festival you will not be sold to. The wide array of food and drink ferments are not for sale, they are there to sample. We always have food and drink to purchase for a meal on the rooftop but the mission of festival has always been firmly rooted in no sales. Our one-night, annual event fosters learning, connecting, communicating and celebrating fermentation with one another. We believe that transactional interactions often get in the way of that.
Ok, without further ado, 2018 festival photos! Stay stinky! XOXOXO
Festival special guests — the Kombucha Ship team all the way from Tokyo! Left to right: Kantaro Oizumi, Yuji Shimada and Hiroshi.
Our other very special festival guests from Tokyo — Kitchen Nippon! Left to right: Takako Matsumoto, Machiko Tateno, Kaoru Shibata and Miho Inada. Photo by Earnest Migaki.
We kicked off the festival this year with a Panel of Experts on Japanese ferments. In the above photos I introduced you to Kaoru, Machiko and Yuji but just to the right of me (I’m moderating and in the red dress ;) is festival co-organizer Heidi Nestler of Wanpaku Natto and at the far right are our very generous translators — Yoko Furukawa and Jeff Hammerly of Travel Portland. We had some audio difficulties and the beginning of the panel so we had to really project our voices without microphones as I’m doing here. I almost lost my voice! Photo by Claudia Lucero.
Festival co-organizer Claudia Lucero of Urban Cheesecraft dreamed up this super fun festival version of My Favorite Things and put it up on stall doors in the Ecotrust men’s and women’s bathrooms! So funny and sweet. Photo by Theresa Minor.
Every year before we open the festival doors I like to try to get as many exhibitor photos as possible. I didn’t manage to get as many as I usually do this year — running around — but I got this cute one of Choi’s Kimchi!
And this sweet one of Stinging Kombucha Hot Sauce! Hot stuff ;)
I asked festival co-organizer Claudia Lucero, on the left, for this cute photo of her and Kantaro Oizumi from Kombucha Ship at her SCOBY Adoption Center! Kantaro is taking one of Claudia’s SCOBYs home to Japan! I love that she put this SCOBY Adoption Center together this year. They went fast. Such a great idea. Next year we’ll bring even more of them. Excited for attendees to use them and share in the fermentation fervor!
Once we got our mics the panel was even better. We were heard all sorts of great fermentation in Japan stories and insights from Kaoru (speaking here) and Machiko (to her left) from Kitchen Nippon as well as Yuji of Kombucha Ship to Machiko’s left and Heidi to my left. My friend Earnest Migaki of Jorinji Miso filmed the panel and I’ll post the video of it at some point soon too. We’ll probably put it up on YouTube. Photo by Earnest Migaki.
And because Sake One couldn’t be at the festival this year (they were in Japan during it) they gifted us some of their delicious sake as well as complimentary sake tasting cards to their Forest Grove sake brewery. With their yummy sake, we had a festival toast to kick off the panel! Everyone in the room 21-and-over got a sample cup of sake to raise in a toast. We toasted with “kanpai” of course!
Kaoru Shibata (left) and Machiko Tateno (right) of Kitchen Nippon Tokyo during the panel. Photo by Earnest Migaki.
Once the panel concluded the first tasting commenced and this is the first photo that I took of the initial crowd. So fun!!
It filled up verrrrry fast with folks eager to try all of the different globetrotting food and drink ferments made by amateurs and professionals. So many tasty samples!! Photo by Earnest Migaki.
Including festival royalty Reverend Nat West of Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider’s unfiltered Korean rice wine — makgeolli. Here’s my friend Josh Scofield, Pollo Bravo chef-owner, sampling it. Nat borrowed a couple of my crocks to make it. Every year Nat makes something new and experimental for the festival and we always look forward to what he brings. Over the years, he’s fermented everything from chicha, Mongolian rice wine and ciderkin to lamb-steeped cider (I kid you not) for the festival. We’re so grateful for his creative and fun-loving festival spirit!
A little closer. I really liked Nat’s makgeolli. It was my first time trying it.
This year Nat and our youngest exhibitor to date, and my dear friend, Kylie, paired up for a festival collaboration. Nat asked Kylie to ferment him a couple quarts of grapefruit soda to blend with some of his makgeolli. The soda was too acidic with all of the fresh juice and zest and didn’t carbonate but it was still really yummy. You win some you lose some — that’s the beauty of experimentation. What did carbonate was Kylie’s…
Home-fermented root beer! She sampled it at her Fizz Kid Soda table and framed her root beer recipe so attendees could snap a photo of it and make it at home themselves. She pointed folks to Southeast Portland’s brew supply shop (my favorite!!) F.H. Steinbart for supplies. So stinking cute. Kylie and her mom, Michelle, are two of my very best friends.
Kylie, Michelle and me in my kitchen after making Kylie’s Fizz Kid soda pre-festival ;)
Festival co-organizer Heidi Nestler’s crew, including her son Joi and his friends, putting together festival mini temakis (aka hand rolls) with her natto, rice and Choi’s Kimchi. So yummy!!!
Had to get a “family photo” of the cute Wanpaku Natto crew.
Aaaand a closeup of the crazy tasty Wanpaku Natto mini temaki ;)
Out on the mezzanine, we had all sorts of fermentation demo’s throughout the night. Heather Arndt Anderson’s fun and tasty whole cabbage kimchi and scrap vinegars demo was really informative and inspiring.
On the other side of the mezzanine was Charlene Murdock’s demo on sourdough levain and how to make a grape sourdough starter for it. Also fascinating and well attended.
In the tasting room, Soma Kombucha brought their rad kombucha kegerator and poured delicious blueberry ginger jun and peach + ghost pepper kombucha.
So fun having Wild Food Adventures at this year’s festival. John Kallas and Rebecca Humility sampled their locally foraged wild edibles kraut which included everything from wild blackberries and wood sorrel, to wild carrot flower heads, dandelion flower petals, common mallow and much, much more. So cool!
And next to them was one of our festival favorites — Sash Sunday’s OlyKraut with April sampling the goods. So delicious as always!!!
Throughout the night, just outside of the main tasting room, the Fermentation Station was hopping! All sorts of festival attendees got to try their hand at making their own veggie ferment and taking it home to ferment! Thank you festival co-organizer, Claudia Lucero, for dreaming this up and making it happen, thanks so much to the kick-ass volunteers who helped out at it and big, big thanks to People’s Food Co-op for donating all of the delicious veggies for it. So great!
Here’s cutest Claudia inside the tasting room at her booth.
And Claudia’s friend Gwynnie Vernon sampling all different Claudia/Urban Cheesecraft dairy and dairy-free deliciousness. Claudia’s dairy-free cheese book comes out this February!! You can pre-order it from your favorite (hopefully indie) bookstore.
Another super tasty Claudia sample — really yummy Greek yogurt with black sesame seeds, honey and smoked salt.
It was so nice to have Tabor Bread back again. I love their breads so much and I only wish that their bakery was closer to me because if it was I’d go there weekly. Their breads are outstanding and Daniel (photographed here) did a really good job explaining their grain program and how their loaves ferment.
Tabor Bread grains!
Even though our festival is strictly a no-sales event (we want folks to have non-transactional conversations — to learn, skill share, get recipes, be inspired), Careen Stoll comes with her beautiful handmade porcelain crocks and pottery year after year from www.lusciousporcelain.com. We love her and we highly recommend all of her beautiful work.
She tabled next too (and gave bunny ears too ;) another festival favorite — Oregon Brineworks’ Brian Shaw from Hood River. OB always puts out the tastiest rainbow-of-colors spread of ferments. We’re so glad that their business is thriving and that we can get their ferments all over town now.
Check out these super fun festival pins that my friend Phoenix Rath made us this year! Phoenix and other friends, including Loly LeBlanc and Kelli Brandt, have been making us festival pins for the past several years and we are so grateful for the cuteness. The pickles are Shrinky Dinks! It’s kind of a big DILL!!
My dear friends Earnest and Yuri Migaki of Jorinji Miso were absolutely slammed throughout the night. Of course they were. So yummy! They brought all sorts of treats to sample featuring their incredible miso including a…
Make your own miso soup bar with a few of their different misos!! So tasty and generous. Earnest and Yuri are friends with Kaoru and Machiko and that is in large part why they/Kitchen Nippon came all the way from Tokyo to our festival this year. Thank you Earnest and Yuri! You can find Jorinji Misos in markets all over town including New Seasons Markets and Uwajimaya.
The Kombucha Ship crew having an excelent time serving up their delicious yuzu and original kombucha that they brought with them on the plane all the way from Tokyo! Only one bottle broke! They stored their kombucha at Reverend Nat’s Hard Cidery, which they love, and Nat brought it to the festival for them.
Kitchen Nippon’s Kauru handing out their yummy, naturally sweet amazake samples to my friend Theresa and her daughter Judy.
Other delicious Kitchen Nippon samples — tsukemono, amazake “mayo” ++++
And big thanks to festival volunteer coordinator Joy Church! Our festival has always been volunteer-driven and we are so grateful to all the big-hearts who help out with it from ticketing to set-up and clean-up year after stinky year. Thank you Joy!
Look who came!!!! Festival friend Cassidy Quinn of KGW’s Tonight With Cassidy. Check out her awesome festival coverage this year in the links above at the top of the post. Cassidy LOVES all things pickles so she came to the festival after her live show. So sweet.
I wish I had a better photo of Vivian Lee and her yummmmy kimchi and teas. If you do please send it along because I can swap it out.
Yummmmm!
We love Thubten Comerford. He has exhibited at our past few festivals and his Buckman Brines ferments are so tasty! This year he brought fermented corn and chile and people couldn’t get enough of it. Including me!
YUM!
I never got to try Shun Ishida’s Eggurt yogurt drink that he brought to the festival but I’m looking forward to trying it soon! It went fast. I love that when you come to our festival you get to talk to so many of the makers themselves. A rare treat.
Longtime festival friends left-to-right Loly LeBlanc (and her baby pickle ;), my finest fellow Jimbo Sandberg and Jess Bull. Loly and Jess always work the ticketing table, although this year Loly helped out at our sweet Fizz Kid Kylie’s table. And Jimbo makes us our annual festival playlist that plays throughout the night on the beautiful Ecotrust rooftop. What cuties.
Speaking of the rooftop — look how beautiful it was! I didn’t get up there until the later side of the night but I’m so glad that I did. Gorgeous night. Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider, Obon and Ecotrust were on the roof and DJ Jimbo’s music made everyone feel so good.
It was hard to get a good photo up there because it was so dark but I did manage this one of Obon’s Humiko and Jason hard at blurrrrrry work ;).
And all of these lovelies taking a much deserved break and enjoying some yummy Obon food.
And this is the perfect closing shot from Kitchen Nippon’s Kaoru and Machiko. Big hugs and thank you, thank you to everyone who came out for our ninth annual Portland Fermentation Festival. See you next year! XOXOXOXOXO (Photo by Earnest Migaki)
