Sauerkraut: you either love it or you
hate it, but you might want to reserve your opinion until you've tried fresh
sauerkraut. Sauerkraut in the 18th century could mean life or death to a
sailor or soldier. Thanks for joining us today on 18th
century cooking with James Townsend and son. ♫Intro music♫ So sauerkraut's usually not my, say,
favorite thing; it's a little too, what can I say, it's a little too sour,
but I like it when it's paired with other things. When it's maybe an ingredient in another
dish and well some people probably wouldn't argue with me that sauerkraut
is an acquired taste. When the 18th century Scottish physician
James Lind performed clinical trials looking for the prevention and the cure
of scurvy, he found that acidic foods like citrus
and sauerkraut were excellent remedies. Scurvy is a horrible and painful disease
that left untreated meant certain death. It's estimated that during the Age of
Sail more than 2 million sailors died from that disease. That's more than that
died from injuries, other diseases, and war casualties combined. In addition, General George Washington
in a requisition to Congress in 1777 requested large amounts of sauerkraut. So when Lind published his findings in
1753 it had revolutionary effects on the lives of sailors and soldiers as well.
Like I said earlier, sauerkraut can be an acquired taste and it certainly was in
18th century. The famous explorer Captain Cook had sauerkraut along on his
journey, but the the sailors weren't very happy with it, so to qualm their complaints he actually
ate the sauerkraut in their presence to encourage their eating of it and it
actually had an immediate effect. Sauerkraut is assumed by many to be
primarily a German dish, but many other countries or cultures had it too: the
Dutch, the French had their version, the Italians, the Russians and many more. Some believed it originated in northern
climates where early frosts might destroy the cabbage crop and so farmers needed a way to preserve their cabbages for the long term or over the winter. What turns cabbage into sauerkraut is
the fermentation process. There were a few 18th century recipes
for sauerkraut that actually suggested the introduction of yeast
into the sauerkraut barrel. Most recipes, however, anticipated the spontaneous
fermentation going on inside the dish. And now of course we know that
that fermentation is caused by the Lactobacillus. They didn't at the time.
The same kind of fermentation that you would find in cheeses and in yogurt, so
there's really no need to put yeast in your sauerkraut. The basic manufacture of sauerkraut is very simple. They're just two ingredients. You need
cabbage and you need salt. I recommend one or two tablespoons of salt per pound of cabbage. To get started, we need to select a quality cabbage. You'll need to remove the outer damaged leaves. Once that you've got those leaves off, you can slice your cabbage in half and then take out the heart. So you need to slice up your cabbage
into the slivers. You can either use a nice big knife, that
can be difficult. You can use a food processor at home or
you can use a mandolin or slaw cutter like this one. We picked this one up very
recently at a garage sale. This one's, you know, probably from early
20th century but remarkably the the design is very similar. It's been used ...
similar ones have been used for hundreds of years. The fermentation process is very simple
and you, really, you start out with a container and you can use, say, like a barrel like they would have used in the 18th century. They also used crocks. They were very
popular. Here's a, here's an older ceramic crock. We're going to be using a smaller ... just
one of our storage jars. We don't make a whole lot. It really depends. The
container depends on how much you want to make. You at home, you could even make this in a mason jar. It's very simple. So there is one caveat, however; if you
want to use an old crock, an antique crock unless its salt glaze, and even then if
it's salt glaze on the outside, it's likely that it might be lead glaze
on the inside. And sauerkraut is acidic and so that it might draw the lead out of that glaze, so I
actually don't suggest using an antique crock for making your sauerkraut. Modern
ones would likely have the proper kind of glaze so that would be all right. We're gonna sprinkle a little bit of salt down in the bottom of this. Make sure to use kosher salt or pickling
salt, even better. Definitely not iodized salt. Now we can
begin to layer in our cabbage and we're going to put a little bit of cabbage in.
But as we put the cabbage in it needs to be smashed down. Now we can use anything; that here is one of our rolling pins, this is perfect for this job or if
you've got one of our wooden mashers another product that's great for
smashing this cabbage down and getting those juices flowing. I'll make sure to put a link down to all
these products down in the description below. As each layer goes in, we're going
to put, we're gonna smash it down and then we're going to add a little layer
of salt and then we go ahead and put in another layer of cabbage. ♫Music plays♫ Now that we've got our container about
three quarters of the way full we can stop putting this in. We, we do want to
make sure it's all smashed down nice and tight in our container and we're
actually going to wait a day or two maybe three days to see where the liquid
comes up because liquid is going to come out of your cabbage and it depends on
your cabbage as to how much is really going in and how much you mash it down. How much liquid is going to come out of
that. You may have sufficient liquid in your cabbage to get water all the way up
over the top of your shredded cabbage. If you
need to add more liquid at the three-day mark, if you don't have a solution over
the top of your shredded cabbage you'll need to add a brine solution. So
the brine solution should be something about a teaspoon of salt in a cup of
water. You want to dissolve that salt then you can add that solution in on top
of your shredded cabbage to make sure that it's always underneath the liquid.
Also at this point your cabbage needs to be weighed down so you need to
have a rock, a board with a rock on top of it. If you're worried about your rock
contaminating your your water you can put it inside of a plastic bag. Even a
plastic bag full of water but you want something on top of this
cabbage weighing it down so that it stays underneath the water and doesn't
float to the top. Once you've covered your cabbage and you've got the weight on top of it all you need to do is put the lid on and let it set.
As we're letting this ferment, we need to make sure to wait the proper amount
of time. Bare minimum, this is going to take two
to three weeks; it really depends on the temperature and some other factors. Six
weeks is more normal or even longer. Couple of months. No problem. It's only going to get better. And while it's fermenting you'll need to
check on it every once in a while to make sure that the the liquid level
hasn't fallen down below the level of the top of your sauerkraut. So make sure the
sauerkraut is always covered with water. If you ever find mold growing on the top
of your sauerkraut, you know what, you all really, all you really need to do is scrape that
moldy part off. Make sure you get it all. Re-submerge your sauerkraut and let it keep percolating. It will be fine. Sauerkraut was a
preferred sailor and soldier food because no one had to worry about it
spoiling. I mean, it's already spoiled, right? That, that's what makes it good. Now we're going to let this ferment but,
say, you really love sauerkraut you can't wait for this to ferment. Six weeks or
whatever. You really want it right away. Well, in an upcoming episode, we're
going to be doing another style of sauerkraut that one naval officer the
time period called Tuscan-style sauerkraut and that one is pickled with vinegar. Make sure to stay tuned for upcoming
episodes where we try out this sauerkraut, where we make some other
sauerkraut and other preservation techniques. If you're new to our channel, I want to
welcome you. You can subscribe by clicking the button right up here also check out our related videos. Thanks
so much for watching! ♫Music plays♫
