| Cleanliness Precautions Inoculating your jars is the main step where contamination is possible, and thus must be done in as clean of an environment as possible. If the room you�re working in is clean enough, you can get away with inoculating them in open air. The needle of the syringe, if not absolutely sterile, can carry bacteria and spores from other molds into your cake, contaminating and ruining the cake. Wash your hands and face with antibacterial soap. Wear clean clothes. Anything in the area of the syringe and jars could contaminate your cakes if it is not clean. Glove Box (Optional) If you�re concerned about sterility, a good way to accomplish this is to make a "glove box," an enclosed, semi-sealed box with holes for gloves to go through and a see-through top. A cheap, halfway decent one can be built for only a couple bucks worth of stuff. All you need is a large cardboard box, some tape and saran wrap to go over the top of the box, and a pair of new, unused dishwashing gloves. Tape saran wrap over the top and cut two holes big enough for your arms in the sides. Disinfect the gloves and the inside of the box with Lysol spray disinfectant. A small gate can be cut into the side of the box for getting the syringe and jars into the box, or they can be put through one of the arm holes (if you choose not to attach the gloves to the holes). Oven Inoculation: Cleanliness Simplified If you have an oven at your disposal, forget all about glove boxes and all that troublesome nonsense. The simplest, easiest way to assure cleanliness during inoculation is to do it on an oven rack. Turn your oven on at the lowest possible setting, and let it heat up. Once it's preheated, pull one of the racks out as far as it will go without falling out of the oven. (Use a rack near the bottom) Have your jars and spore syringe all nearby, ready to go. Place 3 or 4 jars at a time on the edge of the oven rack, and begin carefully inoculating them with the syringe. It's a good idea to have a lighter handy as well to sterilize the needle as you go. Flame the needle until it gets very hot, then carefully squirt a little bit of spore solution (if you can spare it) to cool down the needle before sticking it in the cake. Putting a hot needle into the cake will get burnt-on rice flour all over the needle. |
| Inoculation |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|||