Categories: pickles
Ingredients
- Cabbage
- Kosher (no iodine) salt (3 1/2 tbsp to every 5 lbs of shredded cabbage)
- Big stone crock
- Plate that fits pretty neatly in the top of that crock.
- Cheesecloth.
Directions
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Set up your kitchen scale with a large bowl on it, “tared” to read zero when the bowl is empty
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Sharpen your best kitchen knife.
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Wash your crock, and then scald the inside with boiling water. Dump out the water.
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Remove tough outer leaves from a cabbage head. Cut slices about as thick as a dime. Experiment with various techniques. I use a kitchen mandoline, but that’s an acquired taste.
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Once you have a pound of shredded cabbage, sprinkle 2 tsp salt on it (3 1/2 tbsp is 10 tsp, 10 / 5 is 2).
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Work the salt into the cabbage with your hands. Use your fingers. Discover those papercuts.
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Transfer the salted cabbage to the crock. Work it some more with your fingers. The goal is to not have any un-salted pockets. Those will rot.
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Keep doing the above until the crock is pretty full. Push down on the top. You can get more cabbage in there. C’mon. Don’t be a little girl about it. You need more kraut. This pushing will also start to generate the liquid. Note that ideally, the brine all comes from the cabbage. This is why you use fresh cabbage. If you use the old stuff at the supermarket, you’ll have to add brine that you make with tap water.
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That said, don’t fill it all the way to the top.
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Once you’re satisfied with the fullness of your crock, scald the bottom of the plate and put it on top of the cabbage. Ideally, the liquid will come up and cover the top of the plate.
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Fill a quart jar with water and put it on the plate. That’ll push the plate under the surface.
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Figure out a way to get cheesecloth over the top, around the quart jar. This is mostly to keep cats out of your kraut.
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Put in a corner of your kitchen. You want to keep it around 65 degrees.
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If the brine is not covering the cabbage, make more brine at a ratio of 1 1/2 tbsp to a quart of water.
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When scum starts to form on the surface, skim it off. I like to sing my scum skimming song when I do this.
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After a couple of weeks, the bubbling will stop.
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Pack into quart jars, making sure that the brine covers the cabbage. Leave 1" headspace. Wipe those rims. Adjust those lids.
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You want to bring the jars up to temperature steadily, with the water bath to the shoulders of the jars – and then top up the canning pot to cover the lids. This will take a while. The penalty for rushing is a canning pot filled with broken glass and sauerkraut.
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Process THIRTY minutes in a boiling water bath.
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Remove from water, complete seals, etc.