Well sauerkraut is needless to say extremely good for you and is one way to get some helpful probiotics into your system, to maintain or rebalance gut flora. It's also kind of fun to do, quite theraputic on the outside as well as inside.
I make some fairly big batches to stock the store but they are still handmade, just BIG handmade, and its a quite messy and noisy process - lots of bashing and crashing about and a bit of an arm workout too. Fabulous for stress and fairly straightforward to do.
So if you fancy giving it a shot, or if you have any questions, or are just curious read on...
A Basic Recipe To Start With...
2000g plain cabbage
40g salt
Yep thats it! Nothing else! This will give you roughly 1600 - 1800g of finished sauerkraut (about 4 or 5 jars worth) and will take roughly 6 weeks fermenting time.
There's only two ingredients but they are the most important part and you cant make anything good without good ingredients. Here's some info so you start off on the right foot...
So lets start with the cabbages.....
Trim the base and peel them to remove any dirt or insects. DO NOT WASH - you will rinse away most of the fermenting bacteria! If you have chooks slice the scraps up when you are done, they love it - chicken coleslaw!
The cabbage should be moist, heavy, fresh and densely packed inside, like this lovely one!
The last thing is the salt, and just salt, you shouldn't need any water only the juices from the cabbage. I use fine Himalayan pink salt, you can also use Kosher or Sea salt as long as it is a fine grind. NEVER USE TABLE SALT, it has additives like Iodine and free flowing agents that will totally mess with the fermenting.