I Don’t Know If My Kimchi Should Fizz Or Not

I finally got to try kimchi in the last year or so and I loved it. I was thrilled when the wife and I were at Pacific Mercantile in Denver the other day and found that I could buy it in a jar, not having to wait until the next time we went to a Korean restaurant. However, this ended up giving rise to an interesting question.

When I opened the jar of kimchi after getting home, it fizzed.

Seriously, I opened up the jar and it started frothing over, bubbling and hissing. It stopped after a moment, but I had to wipe kimchi juice off the counter and the side of the jar. It was a bit messy, but it was also a bit alarming.

Is the kimchi bad? Can kimchi go bad? Has the kimchi been tampered with? I just don’t know.

We’re all used to watching for products that have been tampered with or gone bad when we buy them from the store. However, this all depends on us being able to identify these conditions. And, as much as I like kimchi, I just don’t know if a jar of it should fizz when opened. It isn’t carbonated, but it is fermented. Also, this is Denver so there could always have been an altitude change from where it was put into the jar.

Bottom line: I don’t know if the fizzing should have alarmed me or not. Maybe it should have, but I ate the kimchi anyway.