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Vegetables from Kaifeng

Da tou cai (salted root mustard)大头菜

Da tou cai is the root of root mustard (Brassica juncea) pickled in salt. It is called a high-salt fermented food, and some Sichuan da tou cai is fermented for 6 to 10 years.

A short entry: the sources we found record only what is said here about Da tou cai itself. Its own sources do not record how it is made, so the steps and scenes below are those of Zha cai, the closest documented vegetables ferment, shown as a guide to the method, not as a record of Da tou cai.

Short entryVegetables6 years – 10 years

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedWhat goes in. No source gives amounts for this ferment.
root mustard (Brassica juncea)
salt

Total time across the steps of Zha cai: 4.9 months – 7.2 months

Start
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Close-up: salt moving into a leafSalt 4 %

What changes: Fresh mustard tubers soak in weak brine and start to lose water

Step 1 of 5 · steps of Zha cai
First salting in weak brine
Time
7 days
Reported
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
4 %
Reported
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Lactobacillus
Yeasts

Output: once-salted tubers.

Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Da tou cai is the root of root mustard (Brassica juncea) pickled in salt. It is called a high-salt fermented food, and some Sichuan da tou cai is fermented for 6 to 10 years. Made in 2 steps over 6 years – 10 years. The longest step, long fermentation (Sichuan), takes 6–10 years (聂鑫 (Nie X.) 2023).

Key numbers
Main step6–10 yearsReported[nie2023]Long fermentation (Sichuan)

What makes this one different

Unlike zha cai, which is a mustard stem, da tou cai is a mustard root.

Related ferments

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

  1. [s1] Chinese Wikipedia, 腌菜 (list: 河南开封五香大头菜)wiki
  2. [s2] FAO Agricultural Services Bulletin 134 (1998), 6.2.10: pickled carrots and turnips 'known as hua-chai po in Thailand and tai tan tsoi in China'gov
  3. [nie2023] 聂鑫 (Nie X.), 赵志平 (Zhao Z.) et al. 2023, 不同年份长期发酵大头菜挥发性风味物质对比分析 (Comparative analysis of volatile flavor compounds in long-term fermented kohlrabies for different time periods), Modern Food Science and Technology 39(5), 234–241 (abstract)paper
  4. [guo2019] Guo Z., Wang Y., Hou Q., Li W., Zhao H., Sun Z. and Zhang Z. 2019, Halobasidium xiangyangense gen. nov., sp. nov., a new xylose-utilizing yeast in the family Cystobasidiaceae, isolated from the pickling sauce used to make Datoucai, a high-salt fermented food, International Journal of Systematic and Evolutionary Microbiology 69(1), 139–145 (abstract)paper