How to Make Perfect Sauerkraut This Autumn Season

**Early October is the perfect time to prepare sauerkraut. This tradition has been passed down from our ancestors, who even had a special day dedicated to it - St. Sergy's Cabbage Day. It fell on October 8th and was celebrated with mass cabbage cutting and pickling. While it may seem simple, making sauerkraut that's juicy and crunchy requires some knowledge and skill.**

**Choosing the right cabbages**

It might seem easy: chop up a head, add some salt, put it in a container, and wait. But to make sauerkraut that's juicy and crunchy, you need to follow certain rules.

The 'Slava' variety is best for pickling, but it's becoming harder to find in stores as it's not meant for long-term storage. However, you can grow it yourself in your garden. Other varieties with white, thin, and juicy leaves also work.

Cut the heads from the garden after the first frost, which makes the cabbage sweeter. Then, quickly start pickling. Choose dense heads with a small core. If a head has cracked from ripeness, that's okay.

**Preparing containers**

In the past, cabbage was chopped in long wooden troughs, with a row of women doing the chopping. Now, a small trough or a regular cutting board is enough. There are also special tools to make the process easier.

Our ancestors pickled cabbage in wooden barrels or tubs and stored it in a cold cellar. Today, people use wooden, enameled, or glass containers and store it in the cellar or refrigerator.

The tools and containers for chopping and pickling should be thoroughly cleaned. Wooden barrels and tubs should also be soaked in water for a couple of weeks to swell and seal any cracks. Then, they should be cleaned and rinsed again.

**Not sparing effort**

The taste of sauerkraut can be ruined by too little or too much salt. Experts recommend using 20-25 grams of salt per kilogram of cabbage.

Only use table salt, not sea salt or iodized salt. Also, prepare the cabbage properly: remove the outer leaves, cut the head into two or four pieces, and remove the core. Shred the cabbage as thinly as possible.

Then, sprinkle the shredded cabbage with salt and knead it until juice appears. This is the most labor-intensive step, but it's crucial for the fermentation process needed for pickling. Many owners add grated carrots to cabbage - the sugars in it enhance fermentation. Spices like dill, cranberries, lingonberries, juniper berries, fennel or coriander seeds are used as additives.

From warm to cold

The salted, crushed, and mixed cabbage with additives is packed into barrels, tubs, jars, enameled pots, or buckets, tightly packed so that the surface is covered with juice, weighed down with a weight, and covered with gauze or cotton cloth. Place a tray or basin under the cabbage container to catch the excess juice during fermentation.

During fermentation, which usually takes three to five days, the cabbage is kept warm at room temperature. Stir the mass with a wooden stick several times a day and remove the foam that forms on the surface.

The cabbage is ready when no more foam forms and the brine becomes clear.

After that, the cabbage is moved to a cool place - the refrigerator or basement.

If you want to salt cabbage in large pieces or whole heads, you will need brine. Prepare it using two tablespoons of salt per 1.5 liters of cold water, adding sugar to speed up the fermentation process if desired.

The cabbage should be completely covered with brine and weighed down.

The rest of the process is the same as traditional fermentation. First, the containers with cabbage are kept warm, the foam is removed, and when the brine becomes clear, they are moved to a cool place.