"Great for the Crapper." Fermented foods from Germany to India, and beyond.

My German auntie heaped a giant scoop of sauerkraut onto my plate.  She looked at me with a smile and proclaimed “Great for the crapper.” Then she let out a roar of laughter, pleased with her motherly humor.

Fifteen years later, at a restaurant in Gujurat, India, my friend’s dad ordered a round of chaas for the table.  My friend leaned over to me and said “Buttermilk.  Very good for digestion.  Helps you to make light.” His parents turned to us and grinned.  My friend’s nuance was certainly a welcomed improvement upon my auntie’s dinner table etiquette, but they both made the same point.  

It seems like every culture has made a tradition of healthy fermented foods to accompany meals except America.  We may put sauerkraut on our hotdogs or match our yoga pants to our yogurt like the women in commercials, but healthy foods are hardly emblematic of our country and our culture.  Italy has olives, Korea has kimchi, and India has chaas… I’ve begun to feel our meals here are incomplete.

I know ‘gut health’ isn’t the sexy term you think of when you’re planning a date night menu.  And maybe the love of a mom is cuter portrayed in fresh baked cookies than in the memory of my auntie piling sauerkraut on my plate.  But I’m charmed by the idea that most countries have a traditional food that, when placed on the family table, comes with the message “I care about you so much that I want to help you poop.”

Digestion is a universal truth.  It unites all people in a way that nothing else can - across oceans, religions, and millennia.  It’s an inevitable, but it’s also fragile.  There are so many factors that can influence your digestive health, for better or for worse.  Though there is a dearth of information available on the subject, for now we will focus on just one of those factors: fermented foods.

Fermentation is the use of microorganisms to partially process food.  This gives the food unique flavors and health benefits.  Because the microorganisms feed off of sugars, they breakdown glucose compounds and make them more digestible for people, even those who have an intolerance to the base compound (such as lactose).  This means, as the fermentation process progresses, the carbohydrate content of a food decreases, lowering the risk of subsequent blood sugar spikes, bloating, and inflammation.  It also increases the body’s absorption of available nutrients in the food.

The use of fermentation arose not only for health purposes but, in ancient societies, out of necessity.  Before refrigerators, industrial agriculture, or CrockPots, preserving food for winter was literally a matter of life or death.  In cold areas such as China and Europe, fermenting the excess crops of harvest season allowed people to have a stable food supply year round.  The easy digestibility of these foods was just a bonus.  This is how we got sauerkraut and soy sauce. 

Similarly, in India, fermentation served to stabilize foods in spite of the intensely hot climate.  Some evidence suggests that fermentation was common practice as early as five thousand years ago; but the first written reference to such foods is to dahi, a type of yogurt, about three thousand years ago.  That means India has been working on the science of a smooth move since before English was even a language.

Dahi is made by heating milk, adding a sample of microbes, and leaving it for six to twelve hours  until it is thick but not spoiled.  In a civilization that depends largely on grains, legumes, and nuts, anti-nutrients - compounds that make nutrients more difficult to absorb - are regularly introduced in the body.  As such, something like dahi which promotes digestive comfort and healthy bacteria (probiotics) can bring balance to a gut that’s been working overtime.  

In an era of processed, nutritionally poor food, the use of fermented foods to balance the impact of anti-nutrients cannot be undervalued.  A 2023 study of data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey shows that people who regularly consume probiotic foods have lower levels of forever chemicals - toxins which cannot be removed - in the body.  There are many additional studies done on animal data corroborating the conclusion that probiotics may limit toxins in the body.  This is because the bacteria absorb the toxins, making them digestible.  

The implications of this study are huge for the modern diet. Grocery stores are filled with artificial ingredients; pesticides are in every step of the food process, from fresh products to meats to packaged food.  Our bodies are being exposed to many chemicals for the first time in history, most of which wreak havoc on our systems.  If dietary changes, such as the addition of natural, fermented foods to your daily diet, can help armor your body against this harm, you owe it to yourself to give them a try.

Probiotics aren’t just essential for gut health, they also improve immunity and mental wellbeing.  This is thanks to the gut-brain axis, a constant communication between the two organs wherein the central nervous system acts as the messenger.  

When the gut is protected with probiotics, it can maintain a healthy lining - its boundary from the rest of the body - preventing it from releasing toxins into the blood stream.  In other words, probiotics are like the gut’s wise friend that says “girl, you’re being toxic.  Stop taking your troubles out on everyone around you.  What you need are healthy boundaries to decrease your stress.”  This prevents inflammation, meaning your brain doesn’t have to waste its energy dealing with the gut’s toxic nonsense.  Your brain will have time for some self-care, boosting your mood and good energy. :)

Your gut is also responsible for the production of some neurotransmitters.  Most notably, it produces ninety percent of serotonin, the transmitter responsible for keeping you calm, your zen friend.  Probiotics stimulate this production, but also!, serotonin is made from the amino acid tryptophan, which your body can mine easily and richly from - you guessed it - fermented foods.  This is especially true of fermented foods with high protein content such as aged cheeses and soy products, and to a lesser degree in dahi or yogurt. 

Dahi can be easily added to your daily diet in so many ways.  In India, it is paired with mango to make the famous mango lassi.  It can just as easily be paired with honey, or even with savory spices such as cumin and salt to make masala chaas, a cooling, post-meal digestive.  You can mix it with rice, or dip salty snacks in it.  It is even paired with a little sugar and eaten for ‘good luck’ before exams, as it boosts bodily and mental energy.

It is almost true that you can do all of this with yogurt.  However, fresh dahi offers a more wholesome product, since the packaged yogurt on most grocery store shelves often includes added sugars or stabilizers and goes through a pasteurization process which kills a lot of the good bacteria (thus killing the point - that it should be good for you!).  If you don’t trust yourself to make dahi, try to find organic, plain, additive-free yogurt, for similar benefits and uses.  Be sure to seek a label that specifies “live and active culture”.

The applications of dahi are simple and bountiful.  For digestive disorders, it has a healing, restorative affect.  After sickness, dahi can offer an easy form of nutrients to strengthen the body.  In Ayurveda, it is celebrated for its calming and balancing effects.  The same is true of its external use - you can apply dahi as a face mask to naturally remove dead cells and grime build-up while boosting the health of living cells.  This is my favorite beauty hack, as it leaves my face smooth and rosy.

Fermented foods are packed with wisdom from thousands of years of global health traditions.  You have easy access to food that makes wellness so simple, it almost feels like a cheat code.  Whether its dahi or any of the other fermented superfoods, making it part of your daily routine can help you heal at the roots.  Kimchi today can be tomorrow’s smile.  Mango lassi can be dessert for both your tongue and your neurons.  Gorgonzola pairs well with figs and a happy gut.  

Spoil yourself - find some ‘live and active cultures’ for a live and active you.