Built structures
Steam oven as an incubator
A steam oven held at a low setting with the food in a covered container, so cultures incubate in humid, even warmth without drying.
Equipment
626 sourced equipment pages: vessels, tools, appliances and built structures.
Everything
Built structures
Permafrost cellars
Deep chambers dug into permanently frozen or very cold ground in Indigenous Arctic North America, used to store whale meat and other seasonal harvests.
Built structures
Icehouse
A structure in which winter ice or compacted snow is stored in insulation and drained, then drawn on later to cool food, separating the season of collecting cold from the season of using it.
Built structures
Root clamp
Roots and tubers heaped on the ground or in a shallow cut, covered with straw and then earth, a temperate and highland way of holding living produce through the cold season.
Built structures
Warm cabinet with an internal food container
Any warm box, proofer, dehydrator cabinet or adapted fridge whose conditions reach the food through a separate container chosen for that culture.
Built structures
Two appliances sharing a workflow
Each appliance does the stage it is good at: a closed pot to soften, a mill or cloth to separate, an open pan or freezer to concentrate or clarify.
Built structures
Plug-in temperature controller on an appliance
An appliance plugged into an external controller so a probe, rather than the appliance's own dial, decides when it heats or cools.
Built structures
Supported pot inside a water bath
A food pot held at a fixed height inside a larger vessel of controlled hot water: the water distributes heat while the milk or whey inside stays still and away from the heater.
Built structures
Sous-vide bath with an open-topped inner pot
A small open metal pot held on a rack or bridge inside a circulator bath, so food can be stirred, added to or cut while bath water heats it from outside.
Built structures
Slow cooker as a water jacket
Water in the crock with a smaller stainless pot or heat-safe jar supported inside it, so the food never touches the hot ceramic and can be lifted out to stop heating.
Built structures
Shallow pan over controlled hot water (yuba pan)
A wide shallow pan of soy milk standing in a controlled hot-water bath, so that the bath heats evenly while the open surface forms film after film of yuba.
Built structures
Rice cooker used in stages
One rice cooker run as two stages: cook the rice, then add koji or malt water and hold it warm with the lid managed, before boiling, straining or chilling elsewhere.
Built structures
Proofer as a multifunction culture station
A heat-only proofer used in turn for tempeh bags, natto jars, kombucha, yogurt and black garlic, each with its own container, rack and water-tray setting.
Built structures
Multicooker with inner bowl and trivet
Containers or a steaming basket standing on the multicooker's rack over a measured depth of water, so the water carries heat evenly to food kept out of it.
Built structures
Several jars in one bath
A circulator tank holding a rack of identical jars, so several small batches share one temperature for side-by-side trials of cultures, milks, ratios or flavourings.
Built structures
Custom brewery used as a nested cheese vat (Hamblyn)
New Zealand home cheesemaker Tony Hamblyn's custom brewery, in which a 50-litre cheese pot hangs in a 70-litre mash tun of circulated hot water; later one tank served purely as hot water.
Built structures
Freezer, fridge and cloth clarification set-up
A liquid set with 5 g gelatin per kg is frozen solid, then thawed in the refrigerator in a cheesecloth-lined perforated pan; the drip comes out clear.
Built structures
Drying cabinet with lined trays
A dehydrator or drying box set up with mesh trays for slices and herbs and solid liners for purées, drying by warm moving air to a recipe's own endpoint.
Built structures
Direct milk in a slow cooker
Milk heated directly in the removable crock with a probe in it; the cook stops the heating by lifting the crock out of the base or switching off.
Built structures
Dehydrator as a jar incubator
A dehydrator with its trays removed or shelves rearranged, holding capped jars of cultured milk at a low setting so the machine warms but does not dry.
Built structures
Brewer for bulk work and a finishing pan
The kettle heats and reduces a large volume of thin liquid such as whey; before it nears the brewer's minimum fill the batch moves to a wide pan for the thick, stirred finish.
Built structures
Brewer as a hot-water service station
The brewer holds clean water at a set temperature for washed-curd cheeses and other hot-water jobs, beside a separate cheese pot, instead of heating milk directly.
Equipment
Blender or food processor
A fast blade in a jug that grinds toasted sesame to tahini, blends cooked or soaked material with water into milky extracts and chops material for pressing. It does not strain.
Equipment
Food thermometer and refrigerator thermometer
A food probe measures the temperature inside food at the probe tip; a refrigerator thermometer measures the cold storage environment. They answer different questions and cannot establish acidity or validate a preservation process.
Equipment
Amazake saccharification vessel warmer
A purpose-rated warm water bath or heated vessel with a food probe, holding rice or sake-lees amazake at the 50 to 60 C range where koji enzymes turn starch into sugar.
Equipment
Shoyu moromi vessel cabinet
A corrosion-resistant cabinet with trays under brine vessels and gentle indirect heating and cooling, for the moromi stage of soy sauce, where soy koji ages in brine for months.
Equipment
Miso maturation cupboard
A low-power controlled cupboard for the maturation stage of miso, holding weighted, covered food-safe pots, with spill containment, kept separate from koji production.
Equipment
Natto incubation chamber
A warm, humid enclosure for natto, the Japanese fermented soybean dish made with Bacillus subtilis, holding it at roughly 35 to 45 C for about a day before cooling.
Equipment
Tempeh incubator with heat removal stage
A ventilated, cleanable enclosure with spaced perforated pouches or trays and a gentle heat source, for incubating tempeh, which warms itself as the Rhizopus mould grows.
Equipment
Japanese koji tray incubator
An insulated cabinet with shallow food-safe trays and controlled heat and humidity, for making koji on a grain bed from a commercially supplied culture, in the Japanese manner.
Equipment
Small warm fermentation cupboard
A small washable enclosure with adjustable shelves and a guarded heat source, used for warm fermentation of foods that need a temperature above room level.
Equipment
Water bath incubator for small fermentation vessels
A reusable insulated tub that holds several small covered fermentation vessels upright in heated water, using an immersion heater and separate bath and product probes.
Equipment
Insulated cooler incubator for yoghurt jars
A washable insulated cooler with a removable jar rack and a low-power heater, holding covered yoghurt jars near 110 F (about 43 C) for several hours.
Equipment
Katsuobushi smoking and drying equipment
Enclosed cooking, smoking and drying equipment used in the multi-stage process that makes katsuobushi, the dried, smoked and mould-treated bonito of Japan, in repeated stages.
Built structures
Waters-Bond remote-firebox smoker
A plywood smoking chamber fed from a separate firebox made of a 55-gallon drum, designed in 1960 at a Pascagoula, Mississippi, fisheries laboratory for smoking mullet.
Built structures
Forced-air evaporative cooling room
An enclosed room, based on a used shipping container, in which fans draw hot dry air through wet cooling pads. The cooled air then passes over produce crates. It is an advanced, powered design for hot, dry climates.
Built structures
Brick and sand evaporative cooling chamber
A built-in-place, double-walled brick chamber with the space between the walls filled with sand that is kept wet. Water evaporating from the sand cools the produce stored in shaded crates inside.
Built structures
Solar tunnel dryer with photovoltaic fans
A solar collector feeds a drying tunnel, and a photovoltaic panel powers a fan that moves the warm air over the trays. The Hohenheim-derived design comes in several sizes, which are not interchangeable.
Equipment
Coolgardie safe
An Australian food cupboard cooled by water evaporating from wet hessian panels, which draws heat from the air inside. It dates from the goldfields of Western Australia in the 1890s.
Built structures
FAO A-frame solar tent dryer
A low-cost, direct solar tent with a black back and ground, a clear front and roof, a raised mesh platform and high exhaust holes. The FAO manual for Afghanistan describes its construction.
Equipment
Refrigerator used as a produce store
An ordinary household refrigerator used to store selected fresh produce in vented crates or drawers, at low temperature and at a humidity chosen by the drawer. Not every crop benefits from cold.
Built structures
UC Davis chimney solar dryer
A passive solar dryer built as a long black-covered table with a clear-film chimney that draws air over mesh trays. The University of California Davis 2018 manual gives its cut list and build steps.
Built structures
Controlled root cellar
An insulated, ventilated underground or basement room for storing vegetables at cool temperatures and set humidity, with separate zones for crops that need dry storage and crops that need damp storage.
Built structures
Backyard smokehouse frame (UConn Extension)
A wood-framed backyard smokehouse built from pine tongue-and-groove boards, with a sloped roof, vent dampers and a door, set out in a Connecticut Extension guide for smoking fish, pork, turkey, jerky and sausage.
Equipment
Indirect solar collector and drying cupboard
A solar air collector that heats air separately, then passes it through a shaded tray cupboard and out of a chimney. The product never sits in direct sunlight.
Equipment
Onion and garlic curing rack
A ventilated rack or shelf on which harvested onion and garlic bulbs dry for about two to three weeks, closing the neck and drying the outer skins before dry storage.
Equipment
Direct solar cabinet dryer
A glazed cabinet in which sunlight passes through a transparent cover onto a dark interior while air moves over mesh trays. The Brace-type cabinet is documented with a dimensioned drawing from 1978.
Equipment
Charcoal-fired kilishi dryer (modified six-tray cabinet)
A six-tray charcoal-fired cabinet, modified at Ahmadu Bello University to dry kilishi with insulation, a DC fan on a photovoltaic panel and a relocated chimney.
Built structures
Injera batter fermentation cabinet
An enclosed, warm cabinet for fermenting teff batter for injera, started with saved ersho from the previous batch.
Built structures
Screened drying cabinet
An unpowered timber cabinet with screened openings and food-suitable hanging rails, for drying meat such as biltong. Air moves through it by natural draft, so the room it stands in sets how fast it dries.