Sukumo Attempt No 2 (small batch)

I can see the downside to the smelly paste and did a second composting from 1.5 kilos of leaves, I didn’t totally dry them out as is traditional, but left some moisture in them, this worked very well, the leaves smelt of tobacco, and went mouldy really quickly, again these were kept in a warm place, they naturally went up to 40 degrees, and then as it got mouldier the temps dropped. Two weeks in and it looks like this:

These leaves smell great so far.

This does seem to be much closer to the traditional method, it smells a lot like the sukumo I’ve got from Japan, plus I seeded a little of the leaves by adding a teaspoon of the Japanese sukumo, I don’t think this is nessasary but can’t hurt to get the right stuff in there!

I’ve got a second batch of leaves drying in the greenhouse from the last harvest from the garden, and I’m pretty confident that this yields much more indigo pigment than the water extraction method. I am also trailing to see if I can compost the water extracted leaves and see what pigment is left.