[hwminich]

one cabbage (medium-large)
sea salt no additives
caraway seeds (optional)

big ol' bowl
canning jars w plastic lids
empty jelly canning jar
wooden spoon

Peel off any yucky outer leaves and feed them to your chickens. Peel off two or three nice clean outer leaves and save them. Shred or slice your cabbage any way you like. I personally like mine sliced very thin and long on a mandolin type slicer. Weigh your cabbage (minus the weight of the bowl) I use grams for this. Calculate 2.5% of the weight of the cabbage, this is the amount of salt to add.

Sprinkle the salt over and toss with your clean hands, let sit for ten minutes or so.

Next use a heavy wooden spoon to pound your cabbage. Your goal is for the cabbage and salt to start releasing liquid, this is your brine; it keeps the cabbage fermenting and keeps it from molding, so don't pour it off!
You will need to pound the cabbage steadily for about 20-25 minutes. Feel free to take a break or get some strong-man type to do it for you!

You should now have a pile of cabbage that has greatly reduced in size and a nice cloudy puddle in the bottom of the bowl. Now you can add your caraway, or if you are crazy, and don't like caraway, then fine, don't! Mix it in with your clean hands.

Now pack the cabbage in a few handfuls at a time to the canning jar. You want to pound it down to get any air out in between handfuls. If you can do this without getting cabbage everywhere and up to your elbows, I congratulate you!

Stop filling the jar with about 2 inches to spare. Take the nice clean outer leaves and place them over the top of the cabbage to keep any small pieces from floating to the top. Now pour the brine over top. Next take a small 1 cup jelly jar and place it to the top, pressing the top leaf and the mass of cabbage below the brine. The goal is to have all the cabbage submerged. If you have to take some kraut out, or move it to two smaller jars, so be it. The most important step is to keep the kraut under the brine.

They sell special fermenting lids, which I have tried, and didn't like. I just use a white plastic lid, the kind you can get at Walmart; these are not airtight. Your krautis going to produce gas and whatever lid you use will need to let the gas out.

Leave this in a dark place at room temp for 10 days. I check it every few days and crack the lid to vent the gas. Don't be worried if all the juice disappears by the end of 7-10 days, that is normal.
At the end of then days, open it up and smell it; it should smell vinegary but not bad or rotten. If there is any white mold on the top just scrape it off, if it smells ok, its good to eat. You can remove the jelly jar and the top leaf now, and keep it in the fridge or on the shelf.

 

[Smitty901]

Darn that subject came up around here this week end. Sauerkraut kind of a big thing with the German culture.

 

[hwminich]

Sauerkraut kind of a big thing with the German culture.

Guilty!

 

[Mad Trapper]

I use 5-gal pickle buckets and a mason jar to pack down the cabbage. Cover with a dinner plate, then a turkey browning bag full of water on top to keep out air.

Make sure you have smoked kielbasa, horseradish, and brown mustard for when the kraut is done

 

[Sasquatch]

Maybe Z German in me but I love some Sauerkraut!

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[hwminich]

Make sure you have smoked kielbasa, horseradish, and brown mustard for when the kraut is done

YES! Someday it will be from my own piggies!
It's sooooo much better than store bought sauerkraut, and a good way to get veggies in the winter in a post SHTF situ.

 

[TG]

We also plop a few chilli peppers into the mix

 

[Chiefster23]

I’ll tell you how to make kraut ‘hunky style’.

Use a large crock or pickle bucket. If using a bucket you have to reinforce the bottom or you will pound it out while stomping. I reinforce my buckets by gluing a piece of plywood cut round to fit snug on the outside bottom of the bucket. I use a wooden baseball bat for stomping.

Shred your cabbage. Throw 3 or 4 inches of cabbage in the bucket. Add a handfull of kosher salt. (I don’t measure) Now pound the s—t out of the mixture until it gets really juicy. Add another layer of cabbage and more salt. More pounding..... must pound until juicy, more juice is better. Now stop for a beer! More cabbage and salt. Pound. Repeat until the bucket is about 3/4 full and you have a good beer buzz going. Now I place 1 heavy duty garbage bag inside another and place these on top of your mixture inside the bucket. Add a gallon or so of water into the bags. 2 bags insures no water leakage into your kraut. This bag arrangement keeps your kraut weighted down but also allows gasses to escape. Place in a cool dark place for a month or two. The longer it ferments the more sour it will become and fermentation speed depends on the temperature. When you are ready, scrape the top 2 inches of slimy gunk off the top and discard. I bag my kraut and freeze it but you can can it if you wish. If it’s too salty just rinse it before using.

We used to get a bunch of guys together, a keg of beer, electric slicers, and a small dump truck load of cabbage. (I shit you not!). We’d spend a whole Sunday afternoon drinking, slicing, and pounding. GOOD TIMES!

One 50 pound bag of cabbage makes about one pickle bucket of kraut.

 

[hwminich]

beer breaks are essential!!!!!

 

[rstanek]

My grandfather used to make it in five gallon stone crocks, peel back top black, crusty top to get to the good stuff, man did it stink, but it tastes soooo good....

 

[Camel923]

The Koreans call it Kimchi

 

[Sasquatch]

The Koreans call it Kimchi

Although I like Kim chi it does have a bit different taste.

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[TG]

The Koreans call it Kimchi

Love Kimchi, Napa Cabbage has a very nice flavour!

 

[bigwheel]

Dang yall our even making us faithful old native American ***** Peeples hungry around here and we aint normally supposed to like that kinda stuff. Think TG has a good idea about throwing a pepper or two down in it..which means as much as I love good kraut I love some good Kim chee even more lol. Think I told this story before..but..I asked this old Korean war vet about kimchee one time. I say do you like kim chee? He say..no I cant stand it but I ate a lot of it. I say why? He say unless a person ate it themselves they couldnt stand to be around the cute hookers. lol. Lot of variants on how to make it. This one looks plausible. Made it several times and it dont sound near as labor intensive as making sour kraut.
https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/classic-cabbage-kimchi-56389571

 

[A Watchman]

I eat sauerkraut regularly, it is hard to beat with some good sausage. But ...... I aint never pounded the ole cabbage .... so to speak.

 

[Mad Trapper]

I'll tell you how to make kraut 'hunky style'.

Use a large crock or pickle bucket. If using a bucket you have to reinforce the bottom or you will pound it out while stomping. I reinforce my buckets by gluing a piece of plywood cut round to fit snug on the outside bottom of the bucket. I use a wooden baseball bat for stomping.

Shred your cabbage. Throw 3 or 4 inches of cabbage in the bucket. Add a handfull of kosher salt. (I don't measure) Now pound the s-t out of the mixture until it gets really juicy. Add another layer of cabbage and more salt. More pounding..... must pound until juicy, more juice is better. Now stop for a beer! More cabbage and salt. Pound. Repeat until the bucket is about 3/4 full and you have a good beer buzz going. Now I place 1 heavy duty garbage bag inside another and place these on top of your mixture inside the bucket. Add a gallon or so of water into the bags. 2 bags insures no water leakage into your kraut. This bag arrangement keeps your kraut weighted down but also allows gasses to escape. Place in a cool dark place for a month or two. The longer it ferments the more sour it will become and fermentation speed depends on the temperature. When you are ready, scrape the top 2 inches of slimy gunk off the top and discard. I bag my kraut and freeze it but you can can it if you wish. If it's too salty just rinse it before using.

We used to get a bunch of guys together, a keg of beer, electric slicers, and a small dump truck load of cabbage. (I shit you not!). We'd spend a whole Sunday afternoon drinking, slicing, and pounding. GOOD TIMES!

One 50 pound bag of cabbage makes about one pickle bucket of kraut.

No need to pound, mix the shreds with salt. Mash them down with pressure. Don't use a garbage bag. They will leach toxic crap into the kraut. Use a turkey baster bag w/ glazed well fiiting dinner plate on the mash. It won't kill you, faster than slower.

If you use a leaded/cracked crock, non-food plastic utensiles/containers, ...... well Darwin will say hi........

I like the beer idea, unless malted meatheads , make enjoying the kraut a baby sitting experience.......

 

[hwminich]

Make sure you have smoked kielbasa, horseradish, and brown mustard for when the kraut is done

 

[Annie]

Great thread! I understand sauerkraut's a very healthy shelf stable food. Good for the gut, I'm told. I've never made it, but I do keep it in my pantry.

 

[bigwheel]

I eat sauerkraut regularly, it is hard to beat with some good sausage. But ...... I aint never pounded the ole cabbage .... so to speak.

Good news. Sounds like it might could lead to blindness or insanity or something. It would not be nice to end up like poor Uncle Slippy. Other than needing glasses he seems to have dodged the bullet on that aspect of the ailment. Whew.

 

[Lavarda]

To be honest, I've never tried making fermented sauerkraut, but I'll try some recipe. This seems useful to me.