52 Easy Fermented Food Recipes (No Whey Required!) (2024)

This is a list of 52 easy fermented food recipes that do not require whey. I chose 52 recipes so that you (and I) can try a different fermented food recipe each week for an entire year. Join me in a Fermenting Challenge to eat more fermented foods!

52 Easy Fermented Food Recipes (No Whey Required!)

I’ve written before about the amazing benefits of fermented foods, and now I’m going to share a year’s worth of easy no-whey-needed fermented food recipes that you (and I) can make, one every week, to nourish our bodies and boost our health.

Last year, I wanted to start eating fermented foods. I got this awesome fermented food airlock kit and I thought that I was ready to go. My goal was to try 52 fermented food recipes, one recipe each week for an entire year.

Guess how many times I tried fermented food last year? Not once. Sigh….I came up against a few mini-road-blocks in my desire to try fermented food. The first and main problem?So many fermented food recipes need to use whey. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got zero access to whey in my life. I think if I started making homemade cheese, I would be able to fix this problem. However, I don’t make cheese so I’ve got no whey.

I’m sure there’s a bunch of fermented food experts who are now screaming at their computer screen that whey is easy to make or buy or substitute…or something. The truth is, however, that every time I wanted to make a fermented food recipe and saw whey on the ingredient list, I didn’t think about what to substitute or how to make whey or buy it, etc…. I simply closed the recipe and lost interest in trying to make fermented foods for the week. Part laziness, part being busy, part character flaws. I have no problem being honest. 😉

So this is a list of 52 easy fermented food recipes that do not require whey. Some of them have whey in the ingredients but they also say what you can substitute, which I found very helpful. I’ve been gathering this list all throughout last year, so that I could make a post as a reference for both myself and for others.

Want to join me in a year of eating fermented foods? Let me know in the comments below!

Maybe if I get enough interest, I’ll start a support group on facebook or an email newsletter full of encouragement or something else fun. It’s always good to have accountability partners!

What You Need to Make These Fermented Foods (and resources):

You can get pretty crazy into fermented food gadgets and items if you want. There are fermenting weights, various sized fermenting crocks, fancy bottles for fermented drinks, etc. I tried to keep it simple and managed to find recipes that just needed a few things.

In theory, you don’t even need the airlocks, because you can just cover the jars loosely and occasionally ‘burp’ them. However, you can have problems with mold, overflow, or failed fermenting, so I got the airlocks to make things easier.

Here’s what you need to make these fermented foods:

Glass mason jars
A fermenting airlock lid kit (this is the airlock kit that I bought)

Awesome books on fermenting and nutrition:

Oh Lardy’s Guide to Fermenting Fruits and Vegetables (only $4.99 as ebook!)
Nourishing Traditions Cookbook by Sally Fallon (awesome fermenting recipes that do use whey, however, the entire book is FULL of awesome nutrition tips for healthy eating.
Fermented Vegetables by Christopher Shockey and Kirsten Shockey (I haven’t read this one yet, but it’s on my wish list!)

52 Easy Fermented Food Recipes

Ready to start trying one fermented food recipe each week for a year? Me too! Here we go! I tried very hard not to have recipe repeats, so each of these recipes uses different ingredients and/or brings something uniquely flavored to this list (example: there are a few carrot recipes, but they are each flavored differently).

Tip:Try to mix and match these recipes. For example, make a vegetable in week one, a sauerkraut in week two, etc. Otherwise, if you just go down the line, you will end up with a fridge FULL of various sauerkrauts at some point, and variety is the spice of life, so mix it up!

Vegetables:

1. Fermented Carrot Pickles from Healthy Aperture

2. Fermented Citrus Ginger Carrots from Delicious Obsessions

3. Easy Probiotic Fermented Carrots from Back to the Book Nutrition

Fruits:

22. Fermented Plum Brandyfrom Fresh Bites Daily

23. Pickled Oranges and Onion from Fresh Bites Daily

24. Fermented Watermelon Rind from Real Food RN

Sauerkraut and Kimchi:

25. Homemade Kimchi from The Prairie Homestead

26. Kimchi with Fish Sauce from Mommypotamus

27. Probiotic Beet and Cabbage Sauerkraut from DetoxDIY

28. Indian Sauerkraut from My Heart Beets

29. Beet Ginger Sauerkraut from Steph Gaudreau

30. Jalepeno Cilantro Sauerkraut from Fermented Food Lab

31. Pumpkin Cranberry Kraut from Mountain Feed & Farm Supply

32. Fennel Sauerkraut from Honest Food

33. Easy Ginger Carrot Sauerkraut from Savory Lotus

34. Purple Sauerkraut from Homemade Mommy

35. Apple Spice Sauerkraut from Fermented Food Labs

Salsas and Chutneys:

36. Fermented Mango Salsa from Fearless Eating

37. Fermented Pico de Gallo from Prepare & Nourish

38. Fermented Salsa from Deliciously Organic

39. Easy Apple Fermented Salsa from Kitchen Stewardship

40. Lacto-Fermented Green Tomato Salsa from Thank Your Body

41. Easy Fermented Salsa from Tasty Yummies

42. Fermented Hatch Chilies from It’s a Love/Love Thing

43. Fennel, Kohlrabi, & Green Apple Relish from And Here We Are

44. Lacto-Fermented Pear Chutney from Cultures for Health

45. Fermented Pear Chutney from Nourishing Time

46. Spicy Pineapple Cranberry Chutney from ecurry

47. Fermented Strawberry Chutney from Fermenter’s Club

Condiments:

48. Fermented Herbal Mustard from Ferment Tools

49. Spicy Horseradish Mustard from Better Hens and Gardens

50. Fermented Ketchup from Grow Forage Cook Ferment

51. Fermented Hot Sauce from Healing Harvest Homestead

52. Fermented Pineapple Vinegar from Om Nom Ally

Which fermented food recipe are you going to try first? Which fermented food is your favorite?

Please share in the comments below what you think about fermented foods! Also, let me know if you want to join me in a fermented food weekly challenge! I might make a facebook group for it!

More Healthy Food Recipes:

Ways to Use Up a Huge Jalapeno Harvest
20 Healthy Radish Recipes to Enjoy This Spring
Healthy Arugula Recipes
17 Perfect Pea Recipes
Delicious Ways to Eat Asparagus