Sauerkraut season in new digs: a new generation

I have come through another sauerkraut making session in our new home.  I enjoy the presence of the restored kraut cutter in the off-season as I keep it on display in a prominent spot where I see it often.  It reminds me so much of my parents and the times we would make sauerkraut as a family.  I talked more extensively about how to make sauerkraut in a prior blog and encourage you to refer there for that experience.  
I applaud all the younger generation who are coming up and embracing the new-found old methods of food preservation.  I encourage all of you to continue on the quest to find better food sources and providing for yourself in the off season.  You are the next generation to bring food back to the home where it belongs.

Sauerkraut, Chapter 2

I will not go into the how of making sauerkraut again this year but refer you to last year's sauerkraut adventure.  With the sauerkraut cutter restored, I was able to really refine the process into a much smaller time frame.  It took me less time to make my sauerkraut from start to finish than it took the Packers to play a football game.

The combination of a sauerkraut cutter (four blades vs one knife) and a pounder (one large chunk of wood with a long handle vs a wine bottle) made all the difference.  I had a one-woman assembly line going in my kitchen.  The cabbage went from sink, to cutting board (cut in quarters), to cutter, to weighing and salting, and into the bucket to be pounded and juiced.  I was so happy with how it all went.  Six large heads of cabbage are happily fermenting in the corner of my dining room.  I was able to get my husband to pound one round of cabbage during half-time when he popped in for a little coffee.

During the whole process, I was able to spend some time just thinking about how long the cutter has been making cabbage into fine shreds for our family.  It sat dormant for so many years, that seeing it in action again brought a little part of family history to life again, for me.  My dad was the person who ran the cabbage over those same blades.  Instead of a stainless steel bowl, my mother had her large, stoneware crock underneath it to catch the cabbage.  My younger sister and I were positioned underneath on either side throwing into the crock any stray pieces of cabbage as we watched our mother reach under to occasionally add salt to the layers.  As the crock filled, it would be slid out and one of my older sisters would take the pounder and push and pound the cabbage and salt together as it wilted.  The liquid would flow out from its cells to form a brine.  The process would continue until the crock was nearly filled.  It was covered with a large plate and a rock or other weight to keep the cabbage underneath the brine as it fermented.  The crock was pushed to a corner of the dining room until it was ready to be canned.  I remember it also being in the basement which may have been during a storage or fermenting period, but our basement wasn't really all that warm for fermenting. The University of Wisconsin Home Extension has a very good publication for making sauerkraut that explains the process very well.

I felt a connection to my father as I ran the cabbage over the blades.  I remember one time that he cut his finger pretty deeply when he allowed his hand to get too close to the cutting blades.  Adding a new quarter head to the top of the lower one kept my fingers out of harm's way.  I cut up the last portion with a knife to avoid the same fate as my father.  It is amazing to me to think he was younger than I am now when I sat on the floor at his feet picking up stray cabbage.  Parents always seem older until we reach that age ourselves.  

It was good to make that first run on my own to allow myself to swim in those memories a little deeper than I would have if I was distracted by conversation.  Now that I know what I am doing, next year it will have to be a party.  I think perogies should be on the menu...with dandelion wine!

Roasting peppers and sauerkraut cutter restored

I'm all "geeked out" over the fact that I got the sauerkraut cutter cleaned, refinished, and sharpened.  It is in beautiful shape again.  The pounder had some dry cracks in it, but I used the mineral oil/carnuba wax to penetrate and protect.  This is going to make the job of cutting cabbage and pounding it down so much easier than last year.  Take a gander at sauerkraut production 2012 and see how I improvised these tools last year.

As you can see, the cutter is essentially a four foot long mandolin.  The pounder has a nice long handle so I will not have to get inside my bucket so far to press the water from the cabbage.  The other exciting part is that I can use the same tools that were used for years by my own family.  There are lots of memories attached to this baby.  Now I just have to wait for the fall crop of cabbage, preferably after all the wedding plans are done so I can attend to the kraut.

I also got busy with peppers from the garden.  I roasted up a bunch and did some freezing and dehydrating.  I have two good batches of ancho peppers ready for a chili relenos casserole that I am planning on creating.  I also have dehydrated my jalapenos for making a smoky, hot powder that is good in so many thing.  I got some really hot peppers from a friend that I roasted and dehydrated, but he is getting those back as they are too hot for my taste.  

The other thing that I was able to get for a good price was a portable gas stove that I can do my canning on outside.  This will be a nice relief from the usual hot, steamy kitchen that I usually have in fall.  I have set up operations in the garage so I am ready to roll.  Now I just need the time and energy.

Restoring the Sauerkraut Cutter

Growing up in our family meant that in fall we would participate in making sauerkraut.  Dad would get the cutter cleaned and sharpened after having spent a long year in our very dank and dusty basement.  The cutter has not been in that basement for over 20 years, but it was in storage with one of my sisters.  It hadn't been used for longer than that.

It has been my good fortune that the cutter was taken out of storage and given to me along with the very valuable stomper.  I brought it home and hosed it off.  Then I took it apart and cleaned all the pieces, there was even some antique shreds of cabbage in the crevices.  I really scrubbed it down.  Naval jelly had to be used on the metal to take off the rust.  I was able to go to my Ace Hardware and find the right guy to sell me the right products for the wood and metal restoration.  I love Elliott's Ace.  

The wood looks beautiful with it's new finish of mineral oil and carnuba wax.  The metal is steel gray again.  I am going to rub it all down before putting it all back together.  I think my days of hand cutting my cabbage are over.

Sauerkraut...new beginnings

 I started my first batch of sauerkraut...ever.  The last time I remember taking part in the process, I was about eight years old. I was sitting under the legs of the adults while they cut the cabbage on the "kraut cutter".  It was build to fit between our kitchen sink and the adjacent cabinet.  My younger sister, Lisa, and I were in charge of picking up the cabbage that didn't land in the crock and adding it to the rest.  The only other person that came down by us, was our mom.  She would bend down to sprinkle in a layer of salt every so often between the layers of cabbage.  I don't have a kraut cutter, or a mandolin (the miniature version of our kraut cutter, or a large enough food processor.  I do have cutting boards and a large, sharp knife.  Last Friday morning I worked my way through six heads of cabbage one eighth of an inch at a time.  I'm sure that my great grandmother did it this way, so why couldn't I?!

In true style for everything I do, I read up on it first.  The Pickled Pantry by Andrea Chesman was my first encouragement to try something I had very limited experience with.  I consulted the Ball Canning and Freezing handbook.  I had the University of Wisconsin Extension handbook that I picked up at State Fair YEARS ago.  They have the same publication on line in pdf format.  Same words, different format.  I talked with friends and family on-line, at work, over the phone, and even strangers who wanted to talk canning.  The one thing I couldn't do, which would have made me much more at ease, was talk to my mom.  She's been gone for 18 months and there are still times I want to pick up the phone to ask her a question.  I wanted to pick up the phone several times on Friday, but I just sent thoughts heavenward in hopes that some divine inspiration would come seeping downward to get me through.  
I improvised.  I didn't have the cutter, the stomper, or the crock.  I made do with a knife, a wine bottle, and a re-purposed pickle pail (this is food grade plastic, laundry detergent pails are not).  With a bit of advise from my friend's mother (the cabbage from our drought summer was not going to be moist enough), I was able to decide to make up a brine one and one half tablespoons of salt per quart of water to add to the pail.  This advise was my sanity saver.  I mixed my three tablespoons of pickling salt (don't used iodized) to the five pounds of shredded cabbage.  The directions said to let is wilt for five minutes.  I would cut the next five pounds while the first sat wilting.  Layer by layer I added it to the pail while pounding it down with my flat bottomed wine bottle.  It was juicing but not enough to cover the cabbage no matter how much I pounded it down.  I would add some cool brine a little at a time until it came to the surface.  

 Layer by layer, batch after batch.  Cut, salt, wait, pound.  In the end six head of cabbage, which were average size by farm market standards, filled the pail just over half.  My arms were tired, my hands were cramped.  Tasting bits of salted cabbage took me back to the linoleum floor under the cutting board.  I missed my mom more than I have in many months.  My full canning shelf remind me of the hours she put into preserving food for our family.  Hers was at least 3 times the size of my own.
I made more brine and let it cool as I finished up my cabbage lasagna.  The higher the layers came, the easier it got to hold on to the bottle to pound.  I remember Dad standing over the kraut cutter moving the cabbage halves back and forth over the triple blades.  He cut himself every year. In my memory he did.  I will probably be corrected by my older sisters, all five of them.  Dad also did most of the stomping.  We all took a turn, but it was Dad's arms that truly brought out the juice from the cabbage.  Mom was a strong woman in her own right as well.

I had made another gallon of brine which went in to a two gallon Ziploc bag.  After putting a plate on top of my sufficiently salted and liquidated cabbage, I laid the partially filled bag on top of the plate.  This sealed around the edges of the pail to keep the air out of the briny mix as much as possible.  I believe this is working well, as today is the first day I felt the need to skim the scum from the top of the pail.  Bubbles are coming up from below when I push down on the plate, so fermentation is taking place.  As we like to say in our household...it is processing nicely.

I also weighed down the plate with a half gallon Ball jar with more brine in it.  I could have just used water, but if I need more brine, it will be at the ready.  Some liquid has evaporated as it came over the top of the bag.  I have not added more since starting the process.
Most books recommend keeping the crock in an area 68 to 72 degrees during fermentation.  This will keep the fermentation going at a steady pace.  Too warm and it happens to quickly and may spoil.  Too cool and the process takes longer, which means you have to baby sit the kraut with daily visits for skimming.  I also placed the pail on one of my multi-use boot trays.  If the kraut were to be higher in the pail this would be more necessary for possible run over.  I would rather be safe than sorry when it comes to our old, hardwood floors.
I will update as needed so I can keep track of the process for future reference.  In the meantime, we're processing nicely.