The Thing Is… About Sauerkraut

I was eating some sauerkraut with my dinner last week. It’s part of my bacteria quest that I wrote about a little while ago. I was sitting there thinking to myself,

“Boy, this is great. I’m eating this food to help out my good bacteria population and maybe help heal my gut and who knows what else!”

Then an image popped into my head, of my grandmother canning up her soup in mason jars from years ago. I remember it taking heat to cause those lids to pop down and seal.

Hmmm….. heat kills bacteria 🤔. This store bought organic sauerkraut is from a sealed jar. Is there any other ways of sealing a jar other than from heat?

Probably not?

A quick internet search about sauerkraut and the sealing process. Son of a gun! Most store sold sauerkraut is pasteurized and thus killing off all the bacteria! Grrrrr….. I’ve been eating all this pickled cabbage without getting the benefit of the bacteria! The things you don’t know about until you do a little digging (or thinking).

Everyone is constantly scared about bacteria!

Fortunately, making sauerkraut is not very hard to do. I received a little birthday money as a gift and bought some sauerkraut making mason jar lids (stainless steel, I hate plastic, I avoid it as much as possible). I started channeling my inner Ukrainian.

You just have to chop up the cabbage. Add a tablespoon of salt per 2 pounds of cabbage. Massage it in a bowl until it’s soft, and the juices are released. Put it all in a jar, with all the cabbage under the fluid (our kit has a spring to hold it down), and in a month, you have fresh sauerkraut full of good BACTERIA!

The only problem is I have to wait a month for it to be ready. But I suppose, if that’s one of my complaints, I’m doing alright.