Just sayin'

Beet Reuben: grilled Swiss cheese on pumpernickel with sauerkraut, hard-boiled egg, roasted beet, and Thousand Island dressing.

Thanks to Deb and Sean for the idea and Jenn for the inspiration!

The Ballad of Mr. Turnip

This here’s a story about a giant turnip, the woman who destroyed him (that would be me), and his ultimate redemption (I hope).

I was looking for someone else when I found Mr. Turnip at a Minneapolis Farmer’s Market stall. I’d never seen anything like him: a giant turnip almost as big as my head. He was grotesque… yet magnificent. He only cost a dollar! How could I pass him up?

And once I got him home, well, what the hell was I going to do with him? I put him on my kitchen scale, but I did not have enough weights to measure him. I stacked up a package of gnocchi; cans of coconut milk, tomato paste, and Amy’s brand lentil vegetable soup; two bars of Ghirardelli unsweetened chocolate; a bag of Bob’s Red Mill oat bran cereal; and a stray ounce of bittersweet chocolate. Mr. Turnip weighed slightly more than all of it put together. That put him at around five pounds.

Hmm… five pounds. If Mr. Turnip were a cabbage, I could make a gallon of sauerkraut out of him. I’d read that turnips, if given the same treatment, turn into sauerruben: reputedly even better than kraut. We’d just see about that.

As I peeled him, Mr. Turnip released a sulphurous odor that stung my nose and made my eyes water. Had I made a huge mistake? Maybe I should have left him whole and gone as Zaphod Beeblebrox for Halloween. But when I cut him in half, my fears were quelled: Mr. Turnip’s heart was clean and sweet.

With a few minutes’ work, he was a mound of snowy white shreds. I tossed him with three tablespoons of canning salt and packed him into a bag.

“There you go,” I told him. “Get to work.”

I left him alone for a few days. He made plenty of brine, but I didn’t see many of the bubbles that would tell me he was fermenting. This I didn’t like: he turned brown. What was he doing in there?

Ugh, who wanted to know. I left him alone until this afternoon, when I hauled him out into the light of day. I plunked him on a table, opened up his Ziploc, and had a taste.

Mr. Turnip—Herr Sauerruben, I should call him now—still has the faintest whiff of sulphur about him. But fermentation has turned him complex and flavorful. He is milder than sauerkraut, but he has a hint of the same bite as horseradish. There’s a meaty umami flavor to him. He reminds me of daikon pickled in soy sauce.

So here we stand. Mr. Turnip has emerged from his ordeal a transformed being. But I am asking the same question: What the hell am I going to do with him?

So Not in the Mood

OMG you guys, it’s allergy season and spring. Two of the stupidest times of the year in terms of cooking: not only do my symptoms and/or pills render me functionally useless, but there’s nothing to cook! There’s nothing fresh, nothing in season, nothing local or abundant. Yeah, yeah, local food blah blah blah, traditional foodways blah. Back in the day, you know what people did this time of year? They starved!

Well, I guess I DO have some canned kraut around here. Quit bitchin’ and get in the kitchen.

A Thing I Just Made Up This Minute
Hardly groundbreaking, but hush up. I’m crabby and this is comfort food. It tastes good to this Slavic American, so make one for yourself too.

Olive oil
1 or 2 pork chops
1 onion
1 qt sauerkraut – mine has caraway in it
3 Yukon Gold potatoes, quartered
2 carrots, cut in chunks
1 apple, quartered, cored and peeled
¾ c water – white wine would’ve been good too
1 bay leaf, broken up

Heat the olive oil in a skillet with a tight-fitting lid. Throw the pork on one side and the onions on the other. Stir those onions around while the pork browns well, then flip pork over to brown the other side.

Throw everything else in the pan, stir it up a little, and heat to boiling. Turn down the heat to simmer. Clamp that lid on. Go do something else for an hour.

Come back and see if you can cut the pork with a wooden spoon. You can? Yay, it’s done. Oh, it smells good in here. Maybe I can carry on another day.

Yes! You CAN Make Sauerkraut!

Sauerkraut!

If you grew up eating this sour-salty, fermenty, stinky-yummy food, then you had the opportunity to get to know and love it. If you grew up with people who made their own, then I'll bet you jump at the chance to eat fresh, homemade kraut. Not the canned grayish junk from the grocery store. I mean the crisp, golden-colored marvel with a flavor as complex and briny as that of any oyster. Fall time is sauerkraut time. To me, nothing says "ready for winter" like a crock of cabbage fermenting in my basement.

Sauerkraut, like other fermented and/or probiotic foods, may seem intimidating to make at home. Don't you need a bunch of fancy equipment? Don't you need cultures and starters? Don't you need a climate-controlled laboratory in a titanium chamber buried deep in the bedrock miles below your house?

As it turns out, no. Shredders and large crocks make the job go faster if you are preparing lots of kraut. But unless you need to feed a crew of Slavic laborers, then everyday kitchen gear will do. Read on!

Shredding cabbage on the family kraut board

Speaking of Slavic laborers: My maternal grandfather's family came to Minnesota from Croatia about a hundred years ago. They brought with them the tradition of making and eating this economical and easy-to-store food. In a climate where fresh food is scarce for fully half the year, the Vitamin C and fiber in sauerkraut quite literally kept Grandpa's family alive and healthy through the winter.

In the early 1940s, when Grandpa married and set up housekeeping with my grandmother, they bought some Red Wing stoneware crocks in 1, 3, 5, and 10 gallon sizes; oak boards that my grandfather cut to fit inside and press down the cabbage as it works; and a kraut board. A few years ago, my grandmother passed this equipment to me. It is a sacred trust to be the guardian of these artifacts. It is a duty and a privilege to be entrusted to supply the sauerkraut needs of my extended family.

Every fall I buy the freshest cabbage I can get. I weigh it, shred it on the kraut board, salt it, and pack it tightly into the crocks. Within an hour, the cabbage has released enough juice to cover itself with a few inches of brine. It's time to move the crocks to a cool, dark place for the next few weeks. I put the presser boards on top of the cabbage, weigh them down with quart jars full of water, cover the arrangement with a clean cloth, and wait.

The cabbage making its own brine

The top of the brine needs skimming every couple of days. Pressing lightly on the boards will release a few bubbles of the carbon dioxide produced in fermentation. Other than these few tasks, the kraut demands nothing of me.

The kraut might be done in two weeks, or it might be done in six. It all depends on how cold it is in the basement. Colder temperatures mean longer fermenting times but also more flavorful kraut. I know I can rely on the sauerkraut to tell me when it's done: it will stop bubbling a few days before fermentation is complete. Then I'll have a look and a taste. The cabbage will have transformed from opaque white to a translucent straw color. Its characteristic flavor is the final test. The finished kraut can stay in its crock in a refrigerator-cold place, or it can be home-canned.

If you don't have a collection of seventy-year-old stoneware crocks, it's not a drama. You can use any glass, ceramic, or food-grade plastic container. A five-quart ice cream pail will work. Perhaps the best and easiest thing of all is a gallon-size Ziploc bag. You can seal all but a corner, press out all the air, and seal completely. Repeat this once a day and there will be no need to worry about skimming anything off. You won't be able to smell the fermentation, either—an advantage in an apartment or small home.

Sauerkraut
Buy the best cabbage you can find. The head should be dense and heavy, the leaves wrapped tightly. When you try to peel back a leaf, the rib should snap rather than bend. If the stem is still bleeding where the farmer cut off the cabbage's head, then you have picked a winner.

For each gallon of container capacity:
5 pounds of trimmed and cored cabbage
3 tablespoons of salt
Optional: 2 teaspoons of caraway seed or 3 tablespoons of juniper berries

1. Work with five pounds of cabbage at a time. It is easiest to trim and core the head, then weigh the pieces before shredding.



2. Shred the cabbage. Do this by hand rather than in a food processor, which will mush up the cabbage too much. A kraut board or other shredding device makes the work go by quickly. For just five pounds, though, a knife is not bad.



3. Using your hands, mix the cabbage well with the salt and optional seasoning.



4. Pack the cabbage into the container. Smack it in there tightly. Don't leave any air space in between pieces.
   

   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

5. If you are making more than 5 pounds in a large crock, repeat steps 1-4 until the crock is full (leave room for brine).

6. Cover the top of the cabbage with a plate, board, cloth, or some whole cabbage leaves. Weigh it down with a well-scrubbed rock or some quart jars filled with water. If you are using a gallon bag, squeeze out all the air and seal. Cover with a clean cloth.

7. Check daily to every other day, skim off any scum, and press out any new bubbles.

8. When fermentation is done, it's sauerkraut! Call me up. I'll be over for dinner.