The old time Mothers were like scientists. They learned from their own mothers how to set up a kitchen and how each brew, like their pots of vinegars or cheese, would attract certain yeasts out of the air.
My own home, for some reason, is just full of certain yeasts in the air. I could make a glass of water turn into wine ... just kidding. (I wonder if it's because Jesus lives here.)
We all know that yogurt starter is a different yeast than bread yeast, or that cottage cheese needs a dfferent starter than a bread yeast. You can use bread yeast to start your wine or vinegar.
These old time mothers made their own starters because they didn't go to the store, except maybe twice a year. Their own kitchens were like little factories and these women had knowledge and wisdom. To them, it was a common knowledge to know how to make a sour dough starter for their breads and how to keep them going for many years. They guarded their own starters and passed them on to their daughters.
Sour dough starters are just water and flour and maybe a bit of salt, and some sugar, and maye a pinch of store bought yeast. As you set this on your kitchen counter and it gets warm, the pinch of yeast begins to grow. And if you protect your starter, then you will never have to buy store bought yeast again.
But the old time mothers knew how to attract the yeast out of the air, and how to attract the right kind for what she wanted it for. Their families' lives and wellness laid in the hands of Mother and how skilled she was in the kitchen.
In the summer, I have made a grape wine that only consists of grapes and sugar and water. I leave the grapes whole and the skins have a yeast on them that ferments the wine. I have nothing in there except water and grapes and sugar ... no starters. This is why you need fresh fruits to make wines or vinegars. So often at the store, they spray the fruit with harmful sprays that will kill the natural yeasts in your fruits. But, see, I could take two cups of my wine I have brewin' now and make two loaves of bread and not have to use any bread yeast. Like you have heard of beer bread? Well it would be like that.
You have to know how to control the yeast, too. When my wine is done bubbling, I will put a tight lid on it so it won't gather any more yeast from the air and get so strong, it will knock a buffalo down at a dead run. But I will cap this and put it in a cool place on my screened in porch. The cool air will retard the spread of the yeast and keep the wine sweet and light. One time, my wine got too strong, so I used it to clean out my coffee pot. I guess it turned to vinegar. But if you want to keep wine from doing this, you have to stop the yeast action. Yeast loves warm places (not hot), and the cold stops it from growing.
Ya know, to make cottage cheese, you can just let your raw milk sit in a warm place and the yeast from the air will curdle it. Or you can add vinegar to help it along to the curdling stage.
Annie, bless her little stinkin' heart, laughs at me for the way I make one meal as a starter for the next one and on and on and on. But this is how the old-time mothers did it. They would make potato soup from the leftover mashed potatoes from one meal. And then, when the soup was down to about two cups, she grabbed it from the table to start her potato bread for the next day. She knew she would use the potatoes for three things, so when she peeled them, she would peel enough for the mashed potatoes, the potato soup for the next day, and then for the bread starter.
She would start her bread the night before and let the yeast grow in a warm place beside the stove. Now, this wouldn't be a sour dough starter. She would add a pinch of yeast to her two cups of leftover potato soup, and it would ferment overnight, and she would begin baking early the next morning. Of course, she saved her potato water to make bread, too. Potatoes have a lot of something that yeast loves. Potato bread isn't made just for the taste of the potatoes, but for how it makes the yeast grow and the texture of it.
Yeast loves sugar, and if you have any yeast that you think is old but you ain't quite sure, just set your yeast in some warm water and put some sugar in it. If it doesn't bubble, then your yeast is old and won't be good for making bread. I test my yeast each time I bake to make sure it is fresh.
Back in the old days, when I was raising my chidren, I would get so nervous and cry to the Lord. I had so much anxiety about not being able to feed my children good meals. I wasn't about to scream "Uncle" and go get a job. But, oh boy, I would get so scared, and yet I didn't want to let on to my family that we had so little groceries, at times. The Lord always gave me something to feed the family. But it was close, believe me! Papa was just saved and doing his best to work and support us, the best he could. I wasn't about to whine to him that we didn't have enough money for groceries. This was my place of duty and I had determined that, with the Lord's help, I would not fail in this area.
So, finally, I would get mad at God and say, "Lord? Now you gave me these children and they need to be fed. I don't have hardly nothin' to feed them, and this is your problem and not mine."
And the Lord would tell me, "Connie, you have a lot more than the women during the Depression had, and they fed their families." And the Lord would encourage me to read about the women during the Depression and learn how they made a kitchen that was worth something. So I got to lookin' in my kitchen and decided where the warmest place was to let my bread rise and to make my sour dough, or yogurt ... whatever I needed. I used the yogurt in place of sour cream and made creamed cheese with the yogurt, too. I put a little shelf over my hot air register and this was my place, like the old time mothers had on the back of their stoves.
I took courage from the books I read of the old time mothers. And I thought, "If they could do it, I could, too."
And, ya know, I learned how to make wine quite by accident. I decided to make root beer, as we couldn't afford this except once in a while. Well, after I made it with the yeast and sugar and extract, Papa says, "My mother used to let this all set for a few weeks." Well, my recipe was for Sunday School Rootbeer, and you were supposed to drink it right away, and you weren't supposed to let it set and ferment. I was shocked when I found out I was giving my Christian friends real beer. They were shocked, too. I told everyone that it was Sunday School Rootbeer and I was sure it wasn't fermented.
Finally, an old moonshiner told me, "Connie, it fermented. Anytime you let yeast and sugar alone for a few weeks, it will ferment and turn into alcohol."
Oh, the Christian men laughed and teased Jim and elbowed him in the ribs and started laughing again and again. The wives looked at me like, "Only Connie would be makin' her own brew at home, all alone by herself and by accident." Oh, their husbands laughed until the tears just squirted from their eyes. Then the stories began with the men about thier lives before they got saved and how they used to drink, and then Papa would tell about the potato mash and apple jack they made in prison.
And, to my surprise, the world of fementation opened up to me. I brought my very Baptist friend some rhubarb wine for her husband. He laughed and said, "This stuff ain't for kids." One day, he brought me over a big tub of grapes and told me not tell him what I planned to do with it. He said, for all he knew, I was gonna make jelly. I mean, I have kept folks laughin' with this stuff for miles around. It was really funny because everyone knew that Jim and I didn't drink.
HERBS
Around that time, too, I started growing my own herbs. I had grown this valerian? But I wasn't sure if it was valerian or feverfew. Well, it didn't matter at first because I was just experimenting with this stuff, and if ya let it grow tall enough, you figure out the difference. It looks the same in the beginning, but the feverfew has flowers like daisies on it once it matures.
Well, when it was just beginning to grow, a friend wanted to trade me some herbs. I said I wasn't sure if I had valerian or feverfew. So I made some tea with the valerian to see if it calmed me down, as then I would know it was, indeed, valerian. (Folks take valerian to calm their nerves.) So I drank some and I didn't get calmed down, but I liked the taste and drank it all afternoon. I thought it was feverfew. Well, it was valerian and I was calmed down, alright -- it finally hit me like a Mack truck. My eyes would close while I was just walking around. I thought, "Oh, dear Lord God, what am I gonna do?"
When Jim got home from work, I tried to hide this from him. I was sitting talking to him and my eyes would just close on their own. Jim kept looking at me and I kept trying to hide my face. Finally, Jim says, "What on earth is the matter with you?" I finally told him what I had done. Supper wasn't fixed or anything, and I had to go to bed and sleep it off. Well, who could fix supper with their eyes closed? I mean, it was hard enough fixin' it with my eyes open, with no groceries.
I am sorry ... I am trying to be serious, but it just ain't workin' out. I better stop before I go any further with this.
Later, Papa did go out and dig up the valerian and told me not to be growin' things like this.