part time pottery: Fermentation Crocks

Wednesday, March 4, 2015

Fermentation Crocks

So at last my Fermentation Crocks are fired. Now one has an issue on the bottom (and became a second). But my prototype actually works better than expected so I will sell that one.

Fermentation?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i77hU3zR-fQ

On these you can see the "water lock" as a part of the rim. Basically this split rim will hold the lid and then you pour water as much as will fit. This creates a seal where the water prevents the air from going in... it is air tight. I cannot figure out where this originally came from. The traditional fermentation crocks from Europe and the from Korea and Japan have no such set up. It may be a more modern idea.

These next two are also fermentation crocks. The first was damaged as greenware and had to be altered into a crock without a water lock.

This one is more traditional (but smaller than usual) for Kimchi. The lid goes out a bit, this was because such crocks were often buried so this lid would prevent dirt from falling in when you removed the lid but allowed the crock to remain buried.