One of the little products that I found to test and review is what is called a "pickle pipe". Basically, it is a little plastic lid with a nipple on top similar to what might be on a baby bottle (or used to be back when my kids were babies), and it has a tiny slit that stays closed until the gas builds up, and then it release the gas. You can use it for making fermented veggies like pickles and sauerkraut, and it looked simple enough that even I can figure out how to use it. I have looked at those little gadgets that you put water in, and it burps out the gas; but I am reasonably sure that it would be out of my expertise level. So..... I ordered a set of the lids, and they arrived this afternoon. Off to Krogers we went, and I got a head of cabbage and some plain sea salt, and then sat and watched videos about simple ways of making sauerkraut for an hour or so. After that, I chopped up the cabbage, added the salt, and then sat there with a large bowl of it in my lap and kneaded it kind of like you would do with bread, and in about 10 minutes, it was fairly soft and juicy. I then packed it all down in the jar, and put the little piece of cabbage leaf over the top that is supposed to keep everything under the brine. It is now sitting on the shelf in the kitchen and (hopefully) turning into sauerkraut. If it turns out well, I will be making my own sauerkraut more often.
From what I was reading, you need to use some salt for the fermenting to work right, and also it helps break down the cabbage; however, some of the information said that you can decide how much salt you want to use, so it is possible to make it less salty than the commercial sauerkraut. Plus, I used naturally evaporated sea salt, which is much different than the highly processed table salt that is done with bleach and chemicals. Natural sea salt is good for a person, it is the chemically processed salt that is bad for us. I think that you could also rinse the sauerkraut and get some of the salt out once it is fermented, too. If this turns out well, then I will be advancing to some different recipes, once I get the hang of making it. It said to just keep trying it until you have it as fermented as you want it to be, and I can test it in about 3 days.
Is it just for sauerkraut? I'd love to try and make a kimchee with less sodium. I have this thing about sodium, I don't have high blood pressure or anything but if I eat too much I feel uncomfortable, I don't look like I'm retaining water but I feel like I am and that's enough. Can't explain it...one of my quirks.
You can use this pickle pipe for just about anything that can be fermented; so it would be perfect for kimchee, too. I am going to try the water kefir again , now that I have this little lid. When I made water kefir before, I didn't like how it was turning out, and I didn't want to have to use one of those little water-filled gadgets like they use for making alcoholic drinks. I just ordered more water kefir grains, so next week I can start doing that again. With this, it shoud be perfect for all kinds of home fermented foods. Bobby is saving the watermelon rinds, and I saw a recipe for those, and will be trying that next. There are actually several companies that make these lids; but thiss one seems to be the most popular, and here is the webpage that explains how to use one. Plus, there are youtube video tutorials, too. https://www.masontops.com/products/pickle-pipe?variant=8035928773
One of my two Grandmas made lots of sauerkraut, my Dad's mother. The other specialized in high-quality Czech bakery. I ate well as a kid! @Yvonne Smith The little nipple you describe is intended to allow gas to escape, while preventing surrounding air from entering. I use a bit more complex thing in winemaking, called a "water-trap", they look like this in operation:
Exactly,, @Frank Sanoica. Those are also used in making water kefir, and sometimes with the pickles or sauerkraut , and I do NOT want to try and work one of those contraptions ! However, otherwise the gas can cause the jar or bottle to explode, and I certainly do not want that to happen because I didn't know how to use the water-contraption thingie. With this lid, you could probably even make wine if you wanted to, except they only fit on a widemouth jar and not a gallon jug like you use. I will let you know how the water kefir turns out, since it is made in a similar way, and can be made with fruit.
That's interesting Yvonne. I use a 5 gallon crock and the double bag method for making kraut. By making it in jars you could keep an ongoing supply fermenting.
My set of lids came in three; so last night I peeled up the watermelon rinds, cubed them, and put them in a pickling brine that is supposed to be similar to a dill pickle. It has dill weed, garlic, peppercorns and a dab of the regular pickling spices in it. I tried making watermelon rind pickles before; but it was a whole different recipe, and they were made more like a bread and butter pickle, with a sweet vinegar brine. They were good, too; but not spectacular. Mostly, we eat dill pickles anyway; sso if the watermelon rind ones turn out to be any good, I will probably try making more of those. Now, what i want is a set of those little glass weights that you put on top of the sauerkraut to weight it down. The same company makes those; but they are expensive, too, and I don't see any of those on the lists of amazon products to review and test like I found the little lids. How long do you let your sauerkraut ferment before it is ready to eat, @Sheldon Scott ? I saw all kinds of timeframes for curing it when watching the videos and reading. One person was eating their batch in about 3-4 days, and the other extreme said it has to cure for several months......... I hope not ! ! The video where the lady used the pickle pipe tried hers after few days, and ended up leaving it for about a week.
Kraut is one of the "staples" of Czech and Polish home-cookin', at least it was when I was growing up. Today, so many things have changed, it's not a certainty anymore. A variety of types of dough dumplings were made every two weeks or so, always on Sundays. Kraut was often spread over a dumpling cut up into bite-sized pieces, then gravy was spread over the kraut. Yum! Poles call sauerkraut "kapusta", and I think the same word is used for cabbage. Czech word for kraut is "zeli". Often I wish I had learned the language, my Mother always wanted to teach me, but some other youngster-oriented thing always got in the way. Dumplings were "knedliky", knedliky and zeli, a phrase I heard many times, even though my Dad was born in Cicago! My Mother came across the big pond at age 5 in February, 1912 aboard the famous Queen Mary with her mother and two brothers. The Titanic sank two months later. How she learned English is not clear, but she had no detectable accent, and was able to speak a mix of Polish-Russian with our neighbor lady, though she was born in Czechoslovakia. Regarding preparation by cooking of kraut: we enjoyed it the best made "sweet-sour", rather than the real vinegary sour. The same was true of cabbage, especially red cabbage. All kraut and cabbage was made with caraway seed included. My ex-wife made the most delicious red cabbage by including fine bits of bacon or ham. Frank
How long do you let your sauerkraut ferment before it is ready to eat, @Sheldon Scott ? I saw all kinds of timeframes for curing it when watching the videos and reading. One person was eating their batch in about 3-4 days, and the other extreme said it has to cure for several months......... I hope not ! ! It depends on the temperature @Yvonne Smith, usually 3 to 4 weeks. We take some from the crock and let the rest keep fermenting. It gets better over time, up to a point, them we either put it in jars in the refrigerator or freeze it. We have cabbed some before but I'm afraid the heat destroys the good bacteria that are the benefits of fermented food.
I did the first taste test on the sauerkraut today, and it was actually pretty good ! It is somewhere between being a crunchy cabbage and a sauerkraut , and a little more salt than I like; but I am impressed, and will try making more of it. I am pretty sure that I have a small crock that is in hiding somewhere (leftover from the sourdough experiment), so I will probably try making the next batch in the crock once I locate it again. I also tried some watermelon rind pickles, and they needed a little more salt when I tasted them, so I added some salt, and put the grape leaves back on top and will let those ferment a while longer, too. If I keep tasting, there probably won't be any left to make it for a whole 3-4 weeks, @Sheldon Scott ! ! I am really starting to like the idea pf pickling, and just bought a tutorial pickling book on Amazon so I can read up on it more. Bobby and I stopped at the little German store this morning, and he got a jar of his favorite dill pickles, and I discovered some sauerkraut that was made in a wine brine. I am sampling some of that for lunch, and it is really, really DELICIOUS ! ! It is maybe a little sweeter than regular sauerkraut, and not quite as salty or as sour. Lots of stuff to experiment with when learning to pickle, for sure !
My wife has made sauerkraut a few times now. On her first try, she followed someone's instructions and it came out too salty, but now she has the salt levels down to something that we both like.