In some wonderfully literary sense, there must be some kind of unique metaphor that could be constructed around the process by which cabbage turns to kimchi. Personal growth is not always easy, as any success technologist will surely tell you; ?there's a lot of doubt and oozing and off-gassing involved -- and yet, the final product is surprisingly pleasing to the palate.

Yes, it's time for us to update you on our first-ever kimchi experiment. If you want the short version:? I believe we have been successful! For those of you with a few more minutes, I'll share some of the lurid details. Highlights of our experiment included:

Oozing. Apparently, all of the fermentation activity going on within a kimchi pot or jar calls for several inches of room at the top to accommodate bubbling and so forth. Our first mistake was to fill the jar too much -- I think we left only an inch or two -- as we soon noticed liquid oozing from the top. This is quite impressive, actually, as we were fermenting our veggies in an airtight container (the kind of jar with a lock-down lid). I would imagine that quite a bit of pressure had to build up to actually force liquid through that seal. I wonder if having too tight of a lid could result in an explosive kimchi disaster? Anyone care to share any horror stories?

Anticipation.? Back in 1971, recording artist Carly Simon came out with an album entitled "Anticipation." The title track was famously used as a kind of theme song by the Heinz ketchup company throughout the 1970s. You'd think that, being from Pittsburgh (home of the Heinz company), we'd know all about being patient. However, the process seemed to take much longer than we had ... um ... anticipated. Most likely, this related to the drop in temperatures here, lately. (I should note, of course, that our good friend Dave Sokulski has told us of kimchi recipes that take more than a decade. So, perhaps we have more to learn about being patient with cabbage.)

Off-gassing.? Upon opening the jar for the first time, we weren't sure if we'd done something wrong.Is it just us, or is there a rather foul smell atop a freshly opened kimchi jar Honestly, I initially thought we'd dome something wrong. However, once the funky "old cabbage" smell dissipated, I noticed that it didn't smell that bad any longer. So, we adopted our best Fear Factor attitudes and bravely went in for a taste -- and it tasted pretty much like normal kimchi!

We've simply assumed that all of the above items are normal, valid kimchi observations. We've been eating the kimchi, and enjoying it here and there with various other foods.It tastes pretty good, although not quite perfect in terms of the amounts of spices we used.I should note that, as far as I can tell, I'm actually still alive and typing this (so, nothing disastrous has happened to us, nor have we become ill in the slightest). So, I can only assume that what we have produced is safe and "okay." However, I'm not yet an expert, so can't officially recommend that you follow what we did the other day in the video. (If anyone cares to chime in with advice, please don't hesitate to comment!).

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We did, by the way, absolutely stumble across the most delicious recipe ever as a result of our kimchi experimentation! We'll be sharing that soon with the Pure Jeevan family via email. (If you're already signed up with us, you know that we email out occasional recipes! If not, definitely hit that link, as you won't want to miss this unusual yet super-tasty recipe.)