The ingredients on the label read: "Organic cabbage, Sea salt, Dill, Garlic" and that's it. It smells like old sweat socks and tastes delicious, although it will possibly have the same side effects on you as that other fermented cabbage dish, kimchi. As they said in ancient Rome, "Caveat emptor, baby."
Absolutely fantastic on a Hebrew National dog with some Heinz chili sauce and a good Dijon
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26 comments:
We made a few gallons of saurkraut from some cabbages we grew in the garden--it's very easy. Get a big jar of some sort (we've even used an old sun tea jar) cut up your cabbage, cram it in to the jar with the salt, and wait a few days. And you don't even have to pay "organic" prices!
Your ideas are intriguing and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
It sounds like a good match with our customary deer camp lunch of kielbasa with horseradish on a good roll.
Gerry
Grandma had a HUGE stoneware jar in the wash room. Come time the cabbage was ripe the jar would be hauled into the kitchen, brine prepped and drool wiped off chins.
Cooked with pork roast, chops or ribs and mashed potatoes on the side made for some very happy grand-children.
Sadly I may have to abstain from sauerkraut for the rest of my days.
The last two times I had any I...um...
At the risk of TMI let's just say I had the Johnny Cash song"Ring of Fire" stuck in my head for a couple days.
This was new and distressing as I'd never suffered ill effects from the stuff before.
My stomach is growling. You are all sadistic to be talking about such foodstuffs at this time of the morning.
I wonder how boudin and sauerkraut go together?
When I was a lot younger, I dated a young lady whose family were of Germanic decent. I was interesting to watch them make their own sauerkraut. They had a spot in the basement where they put the crocks under the floor.
Pretty good stuff. Sometimes I think I should have stayed with her.
Sauerkraut is some of the foulest smelling food on the face of the earth and yet, soooooo delicious.
I've thought about making my own as it really is nothing more than cabbage and some salt.
Alton Brown had a whole episode of Good Eats on it. I'm sure the Interweb Tubes has a video of that episode somewhere between the porn and kittens jumping out of a Pringles can.
That's some seriously pimped hot dog. Might try Mutt's sometime in OKC.
Sounds like just the thing when one gets peckish during a game of Axis and Allies.
Well, you shouldn't have encouraged me...
Basically there are two things that you have to get right--
1) You have to weigh the amount of cabbage to get your proportion of salt correct (I can't remember what the ratio is exactly, but I'm sure you can find as many recipes on the internet as you want)
and
2) You have to make sure that the shredded cabbage is weighted down and under the brine. I finally broke down and bought a real stoneware crock which has a nice wide mouth and you can use a regular dinner plate with a jar of water on it to scrunch it down; when we used the tea jar we used a plastic lid from like a butter container or something that we could bend to get through the opening, with the jar on top of it.
Oh, and it's a little late now, but if you want to grow your own cabbage, you don't really have to grow that much. We had 4 plants, which was enough for probably 3 gallons of sauerkraut all told.
I also made some quasikimchi, and now that it's been in the fridge for 3 months it's starting to get really good.
I see bluesun beat me to it - if you like kraut, especially "fresh" or "natural" (Hippie.), you might make your own.
It's so easy every Eastern European peasant's done it for like a thousand years...
(Me, I hate vinegar, so I only like kraut rinsed and in small amounts. As a side to go with my spätzle and schnitzel.)
You should try Dutch zaanse mustard. Is very yummy on everything from sammiches to dogs to burgers to snausages to probably chocolate bars.
Amazon link but check your local business listings. Here in PDX-ville we have a Dutch store in one of the suburbs that caries it.
I visited the windmill that it's made in when the wife and I were in Europe-ville.
Speaking of Romans, ever see the "recipe" for garum?
My mom used to make sauerkraut; it was great in a sandwich with kielbasa and brown mustard.
now i'm all hungry. :(
Robin,
"Speaking of Romans, ever see the "recipe" for garum?"
Of course. Hence my love for Worcestershire sauce! :)
Louisiana hot links and kraut and Beaver brand sweet hot mustard wrapped in a thick homemade tortilla. Every American has the right to keep and bear assault food.
Mike James
If I can ever get the planets to align and make it to a blogmeet I'll have to bring you a jar of Boetjes. It's a locally made Dutch style mustard. Good stuff.
As for making kraut...
Go for it.
Should make for some excellent blog fodder for those of us that just hold down the handle on the free ice cream machine with our gaping maws under the spigot.
I can already see a cats and kraut post....
BGM
I loves me some good kimchi, and I think it's good for one's health (something to do with oxides of nitrogen). The Semi-Sweety would not allow me in her presence if I had eaten the stuff recently; something about the way it made me smell.
As a good gun nerd and devotee of Saint Barbara, I am always in favor of all oxides of nitrogen.
Tam, my mouth watered as I read your description.
Gerry, sauerkraut is no longer allowed in our deer camp. The flatulence in the confined space was beyond unacceptable.
Bratwurst with kimchee and mustard is a marriage made in heaven.
Think of kimchee as the Tex-Mex version of sauerkraut.
There's a brand of all natural sauerkraut sold in supermarkets here on the East side of Pew-jet Sound. I can't remember the name, but it's packed in plastic bags and I eat all two pounds of it cold before I can remember what delights I was gonna make with it. It goes splendidly with Costco's Polish sausages and almost any brown mustard and some sour dill pickle to munch on with it. Damn, I'm startin' to drool, the dog is acting weird and my tee shirt is getting all wet. Apparently tomorrow is gonna be Costco day.
Gerry N.
When I was in cloth diapers sitting in a high chair, my father proudly announced to my mother who was out running an errand and had just returned, "Look how he eats that cabbage!" My mother's response to my father was "Oh God, no!. Tell me that you didn't feed that to him."
Cabbage - the vegetable that can be enjoyed twice, and sometimes in between, too.
Went over the edge and bought a BIG Harsch Gairtopf fermenting crock, which has the weights and uses a water seal. Well worth the expense. I now have people submitting orders for the pressure-canned pints I put up.
The "recipe" as noted above is not exactly cold-fusion physics; shredded cabbage and salt, mashed together - though I do put some dry white wine in mine, maybe that's why folks like it so much
I like a sprinkle of crushed dried juniper berries on sauerkraut.
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