Archives for posts with tag: fermenting

How to Make Sauerkraut

July 10, 2010 //
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Sauerkraut Finished

Why From Scratch?

Sauerkraut falls into the family of living foods – cultured and fermented products that are incredibly beneficial for their good bacteria, keeping gut health in balance and aiding digestion.  But most brands found in shops have been pasteurized – that is, heated to kill bacteria.  I get the reasoning behind this – we don’t want our foods becoming contaminated when they sit on shelves.  But doesn’t that defeat the purpose of eating cultured vegetables?  I mean, it still tastes nice, but it takes away all the health benefits by killing the good bacteria along with the bad.

So the obvious solution is to make your own.  Yes, it’s a little bit messy, but it doesn’t take too long and you get a lot of bang for your buck.  One head of cabbage, which costs under $5, produces 5-6 1 litre jars of kraut – which would cost about $8-$10 each in a shop – and which will last for months in sealed containers in your fridge.  And you can flavor each batch to your liking.

Step By Step

  1. Get your jars ready.  You’ll need 5-6 1 litre jars for a whole head of cabbage.  Give them a good wash, then submerge in boiling water to sanitize.  We don’t want any bad bacteria getting in there!  Leave them to dry while you make the sauerkraut.
  2. You need to get your cabbage really small.  The easiest way to do this is to chop it into chunks and feed it through your food processor using the slicing blade.  Alternatively, if you’ve got good knife skills, you can cut it up by hand.
  3. Put all that shredded cabbage in a big bowl.  For each head of cabbage, add 2 Tbsp of the best quality salt you’ve got – I like Himalayan or sea salt.
  4. Time to get messy!  Roll up your sleeves, give your hands a good wash, and start massaging your cabbage.  Imagine you’re kneading bread or giving your girlfriend a nice backrub (hint, hint).  Keep going for 3-5 minutes, until your cabbage has released a lot of liquid and reduced in volume by about 1/3.Sauerkraut Steps 1-4
  5. Add your seasoning.  The traditional seasoning is caraway seeds – you’ll need about 1 tsp for each head of cabbage.  I am also fond of a simple seasoning of minced garlic and chillies.  You can get inventive here!  Whatever you choose, mix it through thoroughly, and remember that you don’t need much because the flavour will intensify.
  6. Stuff your sauerkraut into the jars, pressing down as you go.  Make sure to add some of that liquid that the cabbage released as you massaged it.  Leave a little bit of space at the top before tightly securing the lid – things will get bubbly as fermentation occurs.
  7. Leave your jars in a dark, out-of-the-way place for 3-5 days.  It takes less time in warm weather, more time in the cold.  Check on them periodically to see the magical transformation in action!
  8. When your sauerkraut is ready, it will be significantly lighter in color and taste like, well, sauerkraut.  Stored in the refrigerator,  it will keep for many months.
    Making Sauerkraut, steps 5-8

    Steps 5-8: seasoning, jarring, bubbling, ready to eat

     

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Categories Recipes

Spring Delights, and the Brilliance of the English Language

October 20, 2009 //
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Isn’t it funny how many idioms in the English language have something to do with food? I suppose this linguistic phenomenon exists because food is such a central aspect of our lives. Not only do we, as animals, need to eat frequently to obtain the nutrients that we require for survival, but we, as humans, need to assign value to our foodstuffs and apply our creativity to nature’s produce. So here and there, food words have crept into our daily speak. People, objects and events are “worth their salt,” “sweet as honey,” or “the spice of life.” An unpleasant experience “leaves a bitter taste,” and gossip girls “share the juicy details.” We’ve got projects “on the back burner,” and, hopefully, clients “eating out the palm of our hands.”

It’s with the utmost appreciation of the possibility for irony that the quirks of the English language provide that I venture to share with you “what’s cooking” in my raw kitchen.

First of Spring Asparagus with Pink Pasta and Pesto

When the first asparagus of spring appeared at the farmer’s market, I nearly did a dance of joy right there among the roaming chickens and beautiful hippie children. What I actually did was snatch up a bunch of the slender stalks and danced a mental jig. I brought the beautiful babies home and did absolutely nothing to them – they were just too perfect and sweet and crunchy to adulterate in any way. I took some inspiration from Raw Chef Russell James’ gorgeous Purple Pasta and topped them with some zucchini fettucine dyed with beetroot juice and a great big mound of ad-hoc pesto, consisting of just about everything green I could find in my garden mixed with walnuts, olive oil, garlic, lemon juice, himalayan salt and nutritional yeast. The dish was not only beautiful, but also really fresh and comforting at the same time, and pretty easy to whip up.

Primavera Celebration

Also known as This is Totally Not Lasagne. I have a real problem with calling this raw dish lasagne, even though clearly some the inspiration comes from the baked pasta classic. But come on, what do layers of zucchini, fresh tomatoes, living marinara, nut cheeze, and vibrant pesto have to with the stodgy casserole? I don’t want to serve this dish and have my guests expect lasagne, and I don’t want you to anticipate any similarity except in structure. This is a rich raw dish, but it’s a celebration of fresh spring vegetables, not layers of starchy noodles and cheese and meat cooked into oblivion (no offense to lasagne – I used to love you). I made this dish because juicy, local tomatoes are finally back, as are the first of spring’s local zucchinis. And because I had brazil nut pulp left over from making the most creamy, amazing nut mylk to pour over my grawnola.

Middle Eastern Salad

Sometimes the best inventions just kind of happen. Yesterday was one of the first long, warm, sunny afternoons, the kind that really feel like summer. After taking the dogs to the park, I just really felt like bright, sunny Mediterranean flavors, and this dish seemed to create itself from there. The base is chopped beetroot leaves, but I’ve added almost as much fresh coriander (cilantro), lots of chopped tomato and cucumber, some grated beetroot, fresh spring onions, and a fantastic mix of ground brazil nuts with cumin, coriander, turmeric and tamari, all dressed with lemon juice and olive oil. The garnish is the eggplant bacon recipe from Matthew Kenney‘s book Everyday Raw. I could eat this all summer long.

Quinoa Sprouts

Not too much to explain here! It turns out that quinoa is incredibly easy to sprout. I followed a really basic method – soaked the grains overnight, then left them suspended in a fine-mesh collander for a couple of days, rinsing twice daily. By the third day they had these lovely tails and I stored them in the refrigerator, where they kept for about a week (I’d eaten them all by then). I ate them in just about every salad I had during this time, and they were delicious.

Sauerkraut

This is perhaps my best discovery in ages. A head of cabbage costs less than AUD$4, and it makes two big jars of sauerkraut that last for ages. It takes about ten minutes to make, and all it requires is salt and caraway seeds. Furthermore, it’s fantastic for encouraging healthy bacteria to flourish in the gut and really improves the ecology of the body. My inspiration came from watching Donna Gates on the Renegade Health Show – though I haven’t tried her method yet. The technique I used here is simple: finely chop a head of cabbage, massage in two tablespoons of himalayan salt and one teaspoon of caraway seeds until the cabbage releases a great deal of moisture (about 2 minutes), and then pack it all tightly into jars. I then left it to ferment for about a week, after which I stored the living sauerkraut in the refrigerator. Jayson says it tastes like the real thing, and he’s half Aussie German! Oh yeah, it’s pink because I added in a little bit of purple cabbage that I had left over, and it colored the whole batch. Amazing.

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