Cabbage, salt and a baseball bat

Published 5:33 am Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Sauerkraut is German for exactly what it sounds like–soured cabbage. At its simplest sauerkraut is made from just two ingredients, hard white cabbage and salt. And that’s how Duveen and Jerry Schubert make it in their home south of Pendleton.

“It was my family recipe,” Duveen says. “I’d helped make it on the ranch at home near North Powder when I was a child. It was a job that everybody did, and we all had fun.”

When Duveen and Jerry came back from their honeymoon 50 years ago, her mother gave the newlyweds an unusual gift – a bunch of cabbage.

“So we went out and bought ourselves a sauerkraut cutter,” Duveen says. “We made kraut right after we got married and we’ve been making it ever since.”

Last August about a dozen friends and family members gathered at the Schuberts to take part in this family ritual. The kids helped cut and and clean the cabbage, which the Schuberts grow in their garden, while Jerry and son Mike ran the kraut cutter and tamped the shredded cabbage.

Mid to late-season cabbage, with densely-packed inner leaves and more sugar than early varieties, are best. Sauerkraut is preserved in nothing but the juice from the cabbage and salt.

“Some cabbage is too dry for good kraut,” Duveen says. “You want a cabbage that when you tamp it, it breaks down and you’ll get a nice brine.”

The Schuberts cut the cabbage from the stalk, break off the outside leaves, cut the head in half and remove the heart. Then Jerry Schubert goes to work with the kraut cutter, sliding the cabbage halves back and forth over the blades.

Two or three heads worth of shredded cabbage and salt to taste go into a five-gallon plastic bucket, where it is tamped or pounded with a baseball bat until the juice runs out.

“You need enough salt to make a brine,” Duveen says. “The salt forces the juice out of the cabbage.”

The Schuberts transfer the tamped and salted cabbage to a 20-gallon stoneware crock, filling it about three-quarters full. They place a large plate, about the same diameter as the inside of the crock, on top and weight it down with a rock. The plate pushes the shredded cabbage down into the brine and keeps it submerged. Duveen covers the crock loosely with a towel and leaves it to work for about two weeks.

“We let it work,” Duveen says. “It’s kind of bubbly, with a little foam.”

Sometimes a slimy layer develops on top of the fermenting sauerkraut. This can be easily skimmed off and does not damage the product.

After about two weeks the Schuberts taste the sauerkraut to see if it’s ready for canning. When it tastes right they fill quart jars and process them in a hot water bath. This August they made about 15 gallons on sauerkraut.

“We don’t seem to have any trouble getting rid of it,” Duveen says. “It’s a family tradition to have kraut at the holidays, at Thanksgiving and Christmas. It gets used up, and we usually have only a quart or two left by the time we do it again.”

Duveen likes to serve sauerkraut with browned spare ribs or pork chops.

“This doesn’t taste anything at all like the sauerkraut you can buy,” Duveen says. “The flavor is entirely different, and a lot better, we think.”