EATING FRESH ALL YEAR ROUND

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The crock was placed on the floor on the high end of our kitchen. I should explain that our house is 200 years old and there is not a level floor or square corner in it. The high end was farthest from the woodburning kitchen range which we were using at the time. We thought that was the best place to find a 70°F temperature.

In two days the brine was covering the oak disk. When scum formed on the brine we were to lift off the rock and disk and cloth and skim off any of the white scum that did not adhere to the cloth, then replace the cloth with a clean one, scald the lid and weight, and replace them. I did this the first time it needed to be done but then, as fate would have it, I got a job that called me away for a week. I left Barbara in charge of the sauerkraut scum skimming operation. That's Hollywood.

It didn't go well. First, I had neglected to tell her that the top of the crock was not a perfect circle, nor was the handmade disk. The disk would only fit a certain way. Second, she neglected to notice that the cheesecloth was tucked down around the kraut, not around the disk. When she tried to reassemble the cover it wouldn't fit into the crock. As she tried to make it fit, the crock split open, flooding her feet in brine. The brine continued to run across the kitchen floor until it puddled at the low end of the kitchen. Did I mention that lightning came into the house and melted a burner on the stove and that the dog had an epileptic fit that week? Oh yeah, Barbara was very pregnant, too. As you might imagine, sauerkraut has a special meaning for us.

While sauerkraut making may seem like pickling, it isn't, because it uses only salt. It is not salting either, which is a method of food storage that is not used much at all today. The reason salting is not used is that the salt has to be washed off before the vegetable so stored can be used and much of the nutrient value of the vegetables goes with the salt. We have salted one vegetable, parsley. The leaves are chopped and packed in salt in a small jar similarly to the cabbage in kraut making. The salt keeps the leaves green and, since parsley is used as a seasoning and usually at the same time as salt, the salted parsley is used in place of salt when both are desired. Another way to keep parsley around is to grow it in a pot as a house plant.

And what is sauerkraut if it is not salted or pickled? It is fermented.

Pickling

Pickling uses salt and vinegar with spices and herbs. A number of vegetables can be pickled, the most obvious being cucumbers. Green beans pickled with dill and hot pepper is a favorite of mine. Green cherry tomatoes are another. Pickling is more fun than any other vegetable processing because you can be creative. It is not just a matter of getting things clean and temperatures right.

In the days before generally available processed foods on supermarket shelves, when most households had shelves of home-canned food as well as a full root cellar, pickles were the most frequently given or swapped vegetable. Storage of all the other vegetables was pretty straight forward. Everybody did it about the same way with the same results. Pickles were the items in which experimentation might bring forth a special product. Think of the subtle flavors of cloves, turmeric, mustard seed, dry mustard, celery seed, cinnamon, allspice, honey, maple syrup, brown sugar, white sugar, ginger, nutmeg, white peppercorns, black peppercorns, horseradish, garlic, saccharin, curry powder, bay leaf, hot peppers, hot pepper pods, cayenne pepper, mace, and dill. Perhaps I should say, "Think of them as subtle flavors." They can all be used in varying amounts in making pickles; pickling such fresh-from-the-garden vegetables as cucumbers, onions, cauliflower, green peppers, red peppers, green beans, wax beans, green tomatoes, corn, cabbage, beets, zucchini, and horseradish. A grape leaf stuck in each jar of pickles before sealing will help keep them crisp.

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