Sauerkraut
Sometimes the amount of food in a CSA box may seem daunting. You might feel you’d like a more efficient way to utilize your veggies, or you may just want to experiment with new preparations! If you’ve ever been caught with a backstock of root veggies or greens, one time honored tradition is preserving them through fermentation. Fermentation allows you to both store foods for a long period of time, and even boost our immune function in the gut. Much research is going on right now to identify the mechanisms. What we do know is that sauerkraut fermentation encouraged the proliferation of lactic acid producing bacteria. Lactic acid just so happens to be very unwelcoming to pathogenic bacteria that you may encounter in your day to day life.
On to the recipe.
Ingredients:
Cabbage (red, green, or both) cored and shredded
Any other ingredients you want in your sauerkraut (I used carrots, dill and garlic)
Non iodized salt (celtic, kosher, himalayan, sea salt, you get the picture)
A container for fermentation
Time
1. Combine cabbage and salt in a bowl.
2. Massage until you’ve got a bowl full of brine (salty cabbage water)
3. Place cabbage and brine in fermentation container, making sure that the cabbage is below the water level. A small weight comes in handy here.
4. Cover mixture with a porous top to allow CO2 to escape.
5. Allow the ferment to sit someplace relatively warm (around 65-80 degrees) and dark.
6. Taste every two days or so to monitor the progress and when you achieve a flavor you like, refrigerate and seal your sauerkraut with a lid to slow the process.
Here’s a pizza and a salad I made last night. The sauce is roasted carrots purees in beet juice, and then the toppings (from the farm) are arugula, fennel, and broccoli stems. In the salad I have kale, black radishes and broccoli with some juiced fennel in the dressing. I can write out the recipe tomorrow after work. It’s a bit involved and I want to make sure I get it across correctly. I’ll probably make something else crazy tomorrow. I’m thinking deconstructed lentil burgers using the pulp from the juice I used in the pizza. I’ll keep you posted.
– Robert
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