Book excerpt: Let your microbes take the lead to experience the joy you are meant to live! Donna Schwenk, author of Cultured Food for Life and Cultured Food for Health, has always infused a sense of simplicity, accessibility, and doability into the hundreds of cultured food recipes she has produced throughout the years. She has introduced countless home chefs to the concept of gut and microbiome healing and using fermented foods and probiotics such as kefir and kombucha, to allow your body to work as it is meant to, and heal naturally with billions of good bacteria. But when Schwenk was faced with a cross-country move, she found her own life out of balance. Schwenk knew she needed to establish a stabilizing center, even amidst the chaos, so she crafted easy, on-the-go recipes that could be made with limited time and supplies. By making healthy, delectable foods that were easily transportable in a container as small as a jar, Schwenk realized that despite being caught in limbo externally, internally she felt energized and never once deprived. Schwenk’s step-by-step healthy jar recipes will lead you through making basic cultured vegetables, kefir and kombucha, and and producing more than 100 easy-to-make morning foods, dips, dishes, snacks, desserts, and drinks. From Cocoa Kefir Krunch Puff Breakfast to Winter Salsa to Coconut Miso Soup to Lemon Ginger Kraut to Peanut Kefir Butter Cups, Schwenk’s real-world tested recipes are made for the active, modern household. Whether you are mid-move, on your way to an early morning meeting, helping the kids to get out the door, or rushing off to class yourself, these compact dishes, treats, and quick fermented snacks will nourish your body and mind for the day ahead.