Basic Fermentation: How to Make Sauerkraut

Simple Sauerkraut Recipe

A few weeks ago, we wrote about the microbes that ferment in a post titled A Beginner’s Mind. After all these years of teaching people to ferment all kinds of things we sometimes forget that some people just want to learn how to make sauerkraut. With summer cabbages ripe and ready it is time to make some sauerkraut, be it the first time or the 100th time.

If it’s your first time or it’s been a while, all you need is a fresh cabbage, a clean jar with a good lid, about a tablespoon of salt, and ten minutes of your time.

Okay, I concede it is easier to chop or shred a head of cabbage if you have a knife, so let's add that to our list. Also, it’s nice to mix the salt into the sliced cabbage while it's in a bowl. Although we’ve had to perfect the no-bowl method at more than one poorly organized demonstration, it works. Still, a clean bowl big enough to hold the cabbage is good. Finally, while you don't technically need a weight, as you will read in a bit, it can help your chances of getting it right every time.

That's right, you do not need to buy anyone's lab-made culture to make a delicious, slightly crunchy-sour homemade sauerkraut. All the microbes you need to turn that fresh cabbage into probiotic-rich, fermented cabbage are already on and within the cabbage itself. Those microbes, mostly lactobacillus bacteria, are just waiting for a little help from you to do their thing.

And what is their thing, you ask? They love eating the carbohydrates and producing lactic acid, which is the sour in sauerkraut (sour cabbage), and carbon dioxide. Both of these products of microbes make the sauerkraut safer than the raw cabbage for us to eat. That's because raw cabbage, like all raw vegetables, comes with a village of microbes from the field. Not all of them are great for us to consume, but once you cut up your cabbage, mix it with salt and stuff it in a clean jar, the playing field has been altered in the clear favor of the microbes we want to survive and thrive.

That's the first secret of how to make sauerkraut - create an environment that is ideal for lactobacillus-type bacteria and they will take care of the rest for you. Unlike these bacteria that we are encouraging, some of the bad guys can't exist without oxygen so by keeping our ferments weighted down below the level of the brine we again tip the scales towards the good guys.

That's the second secret of how to make sauerkraut - below the brine and everything is fine. Keep your fermented vegetables fully submerged in the brine and you prevent mold from having anything to grow upon, which is the number one failure point for most homemade sauerkrauts. More on options for weighting in the recipe that follows.

Finally, let's talk about time. Once you have your shredded cabbage salted and submerged in it's own brine its the microbes' job to take it from there to a tasty sour conclusion. How long does sauerkraut take? It depends on two factors in our experience, the size of the batch and the temperature of the room. Smaller batches go quicker, batches in warmer spaces go quicker. So a quart on your kitchen counter in the summer without air conditioning will take as little as a few days. A big 5-gallon crock in your unheated basement in the wintertime might take a couple of months. The following recipe is for a 2-quart jar (or two 1-quart jars) and in a house kept between mid 60's and mid 70's it will likely take about 7-10 days until it's "ready", meaning it tastes like what you are looking for.

That brings up the last secret before sharing the recipe. Taste as you go, as early as 2-3 days into the fermentation, to learn how it's changing and to be able to stop it when it tastes just like what you were hoping it would taste like. At that point, you can stop the fermentation party by transferring it from your counter to your refrigerator, where in the cold environment all you microbes don't die but they do go to sleep.

Simple Sauerkraut Recipe

yields about 2 quarts

This is simple and super delicious. A great first step into fermentation and one of the best ways to eat a cabbage.

3 1/2 pounds (1-2 heads) cabbage

1-1 1/2 tablespoons unrefined sea salt

Remove the coarse outer leaves and save the best of them, composting the rest. Rinse a couple of those retained leaves and set them aside. Cut the cabbage into equal quarters with a knife, and remove the core from each quarter, adding the cores to your compost pile. Finally, slice the cabbage to a size that you think you will like. Transfer your shredded cabbage to a clean bowl.

Add one tablespoon of salt and mix with your hands, squeezing and massaging as you mix. Quickly, within a minute or two, you will see water appearing in the mix as if by magic. That's your massaging and the work of the salt, drawing out the liquid from the cells of the cabbage. Now taste it. It should taste salty like a salty chip but not overly salty, like a mouth of seawater. If it hasn't reached a good salty chip add a teaspoon of salt, mix again, then taste.

Transfer the salted, shredded cabbage to your container(s) a handful at a time, pressing it down with your hand or a tamper. It’s essential to pack as you go, as you want to minimize the amount of air that can be trapped. Remember, you want everything under the brine line, so the less trapped air the less chance everything is going to want to float up. When all is in, it’s helpful to weigh it down, either with a glass weight made for fermenting or something as simple as a Ziplock bag partially filled with water and placed on top of the cabbage.

Set aside on your counter. Its a good idea to place the jar on a plate or sheet pan, just in case you have some brine bubble over. Keep it out of direct sunlight but don't worry about finding a dark place to ferment, it only means you might forget it in that dark place, and forgetting a ferment for weeks or months is no better for the ferment than forgetting a new house plant. They are never better for having been neglected.

After 3-4 days you can start carefully tasting. To do so, carefully remove the weight and rinse off with clean water to reapply. With a clean fork reach down under the brine and retrieve a tasty bit. Now you are tasting for the development of the sour taste and that pickly taste that tells you the microbes have been busy doing their thing. Until it tastes ready to you simply tamp everything down with another clean fork so that its below the brine, then add the weight. When it does taste ready simply remove the weight, secure the lid and transfer to your refrigerator to enjoy in the next 6-9 months.

If you would like to learn more, or branch out with dozens and dozens of other vegetables, I have a couple of suggestions. If you love a good cookbook, consider one that focuses on fermenting vegetables, featuring at least 70 varieties, along with dozens of meal recipes to help you incorporate them into your diet. Fermented Vegetables, 10th Anniversary edition, is a best-seller and was written by TFS co-founder Kirsten Shockey and her partner, Christopher. If you need something more interactive, we have two courses that cover making sauerkraut that you can take at your own pace, asking Kirsten or the other students questions as you go. The first is a popular class called Learn to Ferment Sauerkraut and Pickles, and the second is a comprehensive Mastering Fermented Vegetables.

We hope you enjoy making your sauerkraut and, more importantly, enjoy eating it with friends and family.

Member Announcements

TFS members we have three webinars scheduled. The first is July 25, 5:00 pm PT/9 pm ET. Kirsten K. Shockey and Nicole Morris will be hosting a summertime fermentation AMA (ask us anything) or Q and A, whatever we call it it is us available to you to chat fermentation. Head to the Member Headquarters for the link, or the member discussion board, or look in your inbox, as we sent it yesterday.

In August’s webinar, we host our guest, Amber Peoples, who will present on the work she is doing with Earth Archetypes. Culture is what makes our ferments so magical and delicious. Bubbling new forms of nutrition and preservation. The same is true for human culture when we acknowledge Earth is our home, discover our Earth Archetypes, and work together in community.

In September, we head to Germany and will spend time with Katsu Lask, of fermentationlove, who will talk about German Roots.

Finally, we came across this post today, and it has some great tips for fermenting milk.

Cry Over Spilled Milk