A New York article about the suicide of a Dalton student contains this interesting observation. The dead boy

left filthy socks (which smelled, a cousin said, like kimchi) on his pillow

From which I conclude not only that kimchi is a good source of bacteria (“fermented foods” is a vague category — fermented for how long? — that might contain poor sources of bacteria) but also that our olfactory systems are good at detecting bacteria or more precisely bacterial byproducts. (Kimchi and used socks involve vastly different bacteria but are lumped together.) We don’t use smell to avoid predators or find food. We use vision and hearing for that. Maybe we use smell mainly to decide what to eat — to decide what contains calories (by learning smell-calorie associations, the basis of the Shangri-La Diet) and, as this observation suggests, what contains bacteria.

Mark Frauenfelder says that fermenting foods (yogurt, sauerkraut, kombucha) makes him happy.

I’ve blogged a zillion times about the value of fermented food. Animals seem to agree with me:

At least twice in the past ten years [1998-2008], [elephant] herds in India have stumbled upon barrels of rice beer, drained them with their trunks, and gone on drunken rampages. (The first time, they trampled four villagers; the second time they uprooted a pylon and electrocuted themselves.) Howler monkeys, too, have a taste for things fermented. In Panama, they’ve been seen consuming overripe palm fruit at the rate of ten stiff drinks in twenty minutes. Even flies have a nose for alcohol. They home in on its scent to lay their eggs in ripening fruit, insuring their larvae a pleasant buzz.

It’s possible that the elephants were thirsty, of course, but these stories support the idea that our liking for fermented foods goes back a long way and has a genetic basis. I heard a story about horses preferring rotting apples to fresh ones, which shows how to improve the evidence: give animals a choice between fresh and older food.

The Marukome company calls itself “the leading miso manufacturing company in Japan.” As a corporate brochure says, “world-renowned Japanese longevity is deeply related to the traditional food of Japan.” Miso is probably the most traditional food of Japan, in the sense that the Japanese eat a lot of it per capita, far more per capita than people in any other country. They eat lots of fish, too, but that’s not unusual.

A corporate brochure for the Marukome company that I got at the recent Fancy Food Show makes many health claims for miso. Some involve the whole product. Two are interesting. 1. “Miso soup also helps prevent heart disease and diabetes.” This is vague, unfortunately. 2. “In 1981, researchers at Japan Cancer Center announced that miso soup lowers the risk of stomach cancer when consumed every day. Miso soup also lowers the risk of other cancers including liver cancer.” This sounds like a survey result: daily consumption of miso was associated with lower risk of various cancers. At least it is specific enough to check.

The brochure also makes health claims based on components: Vitamin B2, Vitamin B12, Vitamin E, “Enzyme”, Sabonin, etc. Each somehow improves health — for example, Vitamin B12 “reduces mental fatigue.” What interests me is that “improves immune function” isn’t on the list, nor does the list mention the microorganisms that grow in miso. Improves immune function I believe to be the main benefit of miso and the reason it reduces cancer. Judging by this brochure, you’d think this is a new idea in Japan, where lots of fermented foods are eaten. In Japan I met someone (a nurse) who said that perhaps a third of Japanese think that to be healthy you should eat fermented foods regularly. Perhaps the usual belief is that they improve digestion and better digestion somehow wards off cancer.

I think the Japanese have the most sophisticated fermented food culture in the world. The French have cheese and grape wine; the Japanese have miso, natto, rice wine (sake), and a wide range of pickles. It’s no coincidence, I believe, that the Japanese and French have two of the lowest rates of heart disease in the world, in spite of high smoking rates. Perhaps fermented food gives you a taste for smoking, which provides complex flavor.

My favorite Japanese pickle is called Narazuke. It is melon or vegetables such as cucumber and eggplant pickled in sake lees (the rice left over from making sake) for 1 to 3 years. Two days ago I had a pickle from Guss’ Pickles (a “New York barrel-cured sour pickle”) and a piece of narazuke. After eating the narazuke, the Guss pickle, no disrespect, tasted like it was made by a 10-year-old. The complexity of the narazuke is so much greater. Which is hardly surprising because it is aged so much longer. A Guss pickle might be aged two weeks.