Recipe Friday: Sauerkraut

As I said, I'm back to the YMCA.  Back to the Y means back to exercise, but also back to reading.  I'm embarrassed to admit, but I'm still working on Michael Pollan's book Cooked.  I read so much at the beginning of the year that for awhile I was thinking about trying to read 100 books in a year...and I think I could have done it if I'd kept up at that pace, but then Olivia started to nurse less and my reading time decreased.  Yes, I'm blaming my toddler for my lack of reading.  Mother of the year.  ANYWAY, I'm on the "Earth" section of his book where he talks about cultures.  I really recommend the book, I've found it to be really interesting.  I'm loving this section on microbes.  (Did I really type that?!?)  It's a big part of our food and our culture, but we don't really talk about it.  We're so afraid of bugs and try to kill everything off, that we don't think about the good bugs.  Yogurts are currently
making them more popular, but there's a HUGE counter-culture that's big into cultured foods.  As I read the section, I realized that I should try to eat more cultured foods and it happened to coincide with my grocery shopping day so I bought a big jar of sauerkraut.  I've eaten almost the whole thing.  I'm not really sure if it still has all the health benefits that I was reading about in the book because it's undergone the canning process, but it's got to have SOME, right?  As I was thinking about where I could buy "more pure" sauerkraut that would have all the "good" bugs that I want I remembered that my favorite cookbook, The Vegetarian Mother's Cookbook by Cathe Olson, has a recipe for sauerkraut.  I tried to make it before, and, just like Michael Pollan, I was a little freaked out about eating food that I had kept out at room temperature for so long.  I'm going to try it again and trust that the good bugs will kill off the old.  (I really wasn't going to put a lot of info on here from the book, but a quick story that I thought was interesting comes from a Convent in CA.  This nun was making cheese using an old wooden pot barrel and wooden spoon.  The health inspector was horrified at the "unsanitary" method and told her to use stainless steel instead.  When he came back to reinspect, she had made two batches of cheese, one with the wooden barrel and one with the stainless steel.  Both she purposefully doused with E. coli.  The cheese from the stainless steel was teeming with it, the cheese from the wooden barrel only had trace amounts.  The microbes that had built up in the wooden barrel "fought" the E. coli.  Interesting, right?)

Sauerkraut

1 large head of cabbage
2 TBSP sea salt

Remove the outer leaves of cabbage and reserve.  Remove core from cabbage.  Slice the cabbage very thinly.  Toss cabbage and salt together in a large bowl.  Use a wooden spoon, meat pounder or whatever works to pound cabbage until juices are released and cabbage volume is reduced to about 4 cups.  This takes 5 to 10 minutes.

Transfer cabbage to quart-sized jar.  Rollup the reserved cabbage leaves and place over cabbage in jar.  Press down until liquid rises above cabbage. Cover tightly and place in cool spot (not refrigerator) for 3 to 5 days.  Taste it periodically.  When it tastes tangy, remove cabbage leaves and transfer jar to refrigerator.  Flavor will improve with age.

If you try this, please, please, please let me know how yours turns out!