Sixteen months ago, I put up some mackerel in salt, starting the process of making garum, a fermented fish sauce that was the favorite condiment of the ancient Romans. Now it's time to filter the resulting mash.
Preserving meat and fish in salt is a very old technique. I assume it started with that. Maybe a fisherman or fish monger did an experiment with sea salt and fish guts (which otherwise are useless waste) and voila.
I have been researching the multitude of ways, recipes, varients, types and varying methods of doing this and have learned that 20% salt to fish ratio by weight seems to be the golden ticket. The maximum amount of salt that can be dissolved into the water content of the fish at room temperature is around 28% . Anything higher then that is kind of just wasting salt as it will not dissolve 20% is more then enough to properly preserve the fish without any spoilage and keeps the saltiness of the finished product a little less then full saturation. Just thought I would share that with you incase you ever wanted to do another run with it. Awesome video.
I think I used too much salt. But using too little risks having the fish rot instead of ferment, so I erred on the safe side. The salt crystals that remained can be dissolved in fresh water and recrystallized.
I thought I didn't ear right when you said 16 months.... I thought it would be quicker. But almost a year and half "per garum patentiam" like they would have said.
