Here are all the things I use to make my own casual batch of homemade purple sauerkraut:
3 large strong glass canning jars, with canning lids with rings.
3 Bowls or plastic trays to catch drips during fermentation
10 days of time is all I needed to reach the ideal taste and level of ferment for my home in Ontario Canada.
Non Iodized Pickling Salt
Pure reverse osmosis water
1 Large Fresh Purple Cabbage Head
Clear Plastic Sandwich bags.
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I chopped approximately half of the head of cabbage into fairly chunky bits about the size of a silver dollar.
I sprinkled the pickling salt on the cabbage after chopping it and massaged it into the cabbage.
(note that if you are uncomfortable with using your instincts to measure the salt, you can use the 2% salt by weight formula....simply by weighing the chopped cabbage first and then adding 2% of that weight in pickling salt)
Then I packed it tightly into the 3 large canning jars , packing it down with the end tip of a wooden spoon....trying to push out the air between the cabbage bits. Then I added some pure water to cover all the cabbage in the jar.
Now, here is the fun part. I learned this next part from watching youtube videos. I took a clear plastic sandwich bag and filled just one bottom corner of it with water and placed it while still open at the top on the cabbage to weight it down so that all the cabbage is weighed down under the brine water. Then I rolled the edges of the bag down over the lip of the jar and then I tool the metal ring and screwed it on top of the plastic bag just tight enough to keep the bag in place and provide a clean airtight seal on the jar of pickled cabbage.
Then I placed the jar carefully in a drip tray and put it into a dark wooden cabinet to ferment.
Every 2 or 3 days I would check on the jars and replace the drip tray with a clean one and replace the plastic bags with new fresh bags filled with more clean pure water to weight the cabbage down under the brine water.
The beauty of using those canning rings with just the water filled plastic bags to weigh down the cabbage, is that you don´t risk any dangerous gas buildup due to the fermentation .The plastic can stretch with the gas buildup and with a drip tray the bubbling over will be caught and won´t damage your cabinet.
When I wanted to check it it was ripening well enough, I used my senses of taste and smell to see if I could identify the right level of ferment and saltiness. ( I added extra salt when I felt that the pickling process tasted too watery.
When I did my final taste test on the sauerkraut it had been 10 days since I had begun the ferment.
I realize that this time frame is ideal for the temperature inside our home and the other factors such as the level of humidity and the ripeness of the cabbage etc.
I feel it is important when I make homemade fermented products like this, that I stay in tune with what I taste and smell and feel about the product. Fermentation is sometimes unpredictable and you need to be willing to throw foods out if you feel that some kind of harmful bacteria has begun to sprout in your beloved fermented creation. (Moldy or unclean foods should not be used for making any kind of pickles or fermented products.)
This may seem obvious, but when making sauerkraut make sure that all your utensils and jars are spotlessly clean. If some stray bits of the cabbage stick to the edges or neck of your jar during the process, just take some paper towel and wipe them clean off the jar. Keep the neck and lip and lids of the jar as clean as possible. This will protect the ferment from unwanted bacteria.
The final step is to add the metal lid to the canning rings and put the fermented cabbage jar into the refridgerator for storage. Yumm!
Have you ever done any natural fermentation at home?
Do tell!
Peace,
Carla
