Inspired by this forum to make my own fruit wine, I went to Sandor Ellix Katz's book Wild Fermentation and started leafing through the book. I came across the tempeh recipe, remembered that there was tempeh starter in my refrigerator that I'd ordered but not used and used his recipe. I recommend that you check out his book since it gives a very complete explanation of how to do it. In brief, here's the recipe:
2 cups of soybeans (preferably cracked in grain mill)
2 tablespoons vinegar (any kind)
1 teaspoon tempeh starter (I used 1.5 tsp because my starter was old)
Boil the soybeans in water until they are chewy but not mushy. Drain them (the water is soy milk). Spread between two towels to dry the beans (apparently quite important). Put in a bowl and mix with vinegar. When the mixture has cooled to body temperature add the tempeh starter and mix it up. Then place the mixture into ziplock sandwich bags with lots of holes liberally stabbed into them.
It needs to grow at a temperature of 85-90 degrees F. My oven has a bread proofing setting that allows it to keep the oven at 85 degrees so I used that. Let it grow for 24-30 hours. It can take up to 48 hours in colder temperatures. Katz says that it should have gray or black sections near the holes in the bag. At that point it is done.
I bought my tempeh starter from the Tempeh Lab at the Farm in Summertown, TN but it looks like they stopped selling to individuals. You can buy tempeh starter from several other places online. It comes in a little ziploc bag and looks like flour.
Update:
Better instructions than mine can be found here:
http://organic-cultures.com/instructions_sheets/tempeh_-_pts
