Fresh Sauerkraut

Why fresh sauerkraut?  Fresh sauerkraut is made using an ancient process called lacto-fermentation that can be used to preserve just about any fruit or vegetable.  It involves no cooking and thereby retains the live enzymes in the produce.  The lacto-fermentation process imparts live beneficial bacteria into the food that we desperately need.  Our gut is designed to have as many as 2 pounds of beneficial bacterial in and around it.  With the overuse of antibiotics and chlorine in our water, combined with very little live food, our guts have a fraction of the beneficial bacteria it needs and we pay the price with our health.  Fresh sauerkraut has a delightful salty-sour taste that becomes even more pleasing as we remove sugar from our lives, get over the cravings, expand our palate beyond sweet and learn to really taste food.

Before making sauerkraut, a little planning ahead of time is necessary as you will need whey (the watery part form yogurt - not the powdered form used in protein shakes and smoothies), and whey needs to be prepared. It involves less than 5 minutes of prep time, with several hours of wait time.

Ingredients and supplies for making Whey

1 cup - 1 quart grass-fed, full fat Yogurt

Linen-style kitchen towel that has been washed in fragrance-free soap, and rinsed with vinegar

Strainer

Glass bowl or 1 quart measuring cup

You will only need 1/4 cup of whey for the sauerkraut, and 1 cup of yogurt will yield that much and then some. When preparing whey, I frequently make more to be used in other recipes. 

Put the strainer over the glass bowl and line it with one layer of the kitchen towel (or may substitute several layers of cheese cloth). Leave this out on the counter for several hours. Whey is the part that will be dripping into the bowl. Extra whey can be stored in the refrigerator in a glass jar for as long as 3 months if you have captured the clear liquid only and don't have any of the white creamy part mixed in. The part left in the cloth can be used as a Greek-style yogurt, or strained longer and deeper to yield cream cheese*.

Ingredients and supplies for making Fresh Sauerkraut

1 medium head organic cabbage (green or red)

1/4 cup whey

1 T salt

1 T caraway (optional, but very yummy, and an additional boost to digestion).

A very large bowl

A meat pounder, food pusher, or pestle

3 quart-sized wide-mouth jars

Clean and core the cabbage and cut into thin slices using a sharp knife with cutting board, food processor or mandolin and place in the large bowl. Add the rest of the ingredients. Use the pounder, pusher, or pestle to pound the cabbage (while mixing in other ingredients) for at least 10 minutes, working to break cells in the cabbage to release liquid. As you work, you should find cabbage liquid gathering at the bottom of the bowl. When done, place the cabbage in the jars, using the pounder to pound the cabbage down, and let the liquid rise to cover the cabbage. Leave 1" or more clearance from the top of the jar. Scrape any cabbage down the sides of the jar so that it is all submerged into the liquid. Put caps on jars, and let sit at room temperature for 3 days. Sometimes the sauerkraut bubbles over, so some preventative layers of paper towels under the jars is a good idea.  After 3 days, refrigerate the sauerkraut. It is ready to eat at this time, but the flavors will continue to improve with a little time. This will keep for  3 - 6 months.  

Let your senses be your guide. Cooking and food preparation is a science AND an art. Your senses will know when a properly lacto-fermented food has a delightful sour smell, and when it smells rotten. Your eyes will tell you that the colors are vibrant and alive, and when it is to be thrown out. Enjoy fresh sauerkraut as a condiment, ingredient where a salty/sour taste is desired, by itself, or added to a schmear where your family will not even notice you snuck live beneficial bacteria into their food.

* If you want more whey, and cream cheese left in the cloth, there is one more step: When it seems not much more whey is draining, take the cloth by four corners, and tie them together around the handle of a wooden spoon. Place the wooden spoon across the top of a pitcher, letting the cloth with cream cheese in it dangle into the pitcher.  Let drip for several more hours. Refrigerate the whey in a glass jar. Scrape the "cream cheese" out and store in a glass container in the refrigerator. This cream cheese will not taste like store-bought cream cheese, as it has a sour taste, like the yogurt. It is still full of beneficial bacteria, so it is really a superior product. When used in recipes, like a schmear (See my Smoked Salmon Schmear), you will not notice the sour taste at all.