Sauerkraut Day

Today Micah and I spent the afternoon at Grandma Moldy's house, helping to can sauerkraut. A LOT of sauerkraut. She started with 15 gallons in ziploc bags that she had brought home from my Grandpa Schmidt's house in Bay City. When we left at 6pm she wasn't even half finished!

Making sauerkraut has been a tradition in the Schmidt family for generations (Grandpa loves to tell the story of how eating sauerkraut helped save his very sick brother's life). We still use the large cabbage grater and wooden stomper to push down the cabbage that my Great-Grandpa Schmidt made by hand. The cabbage sits in the crock, combined with a handful of kosher salt for each layer, for at least 6 weeks. I love sauerkraut making day! I wasn't able to participate this year, because I was still recovering from my c-section. But because I am only working part-time now, I was able to help with the canning - which was a first for me.

I was surprised how easy it was - just heat the fermented cabbage with some water on the stove until just boiling. Then we put it into quart and pint jars to can. The longest part was getting the huge pot of sauerkraut to come to a boil.

Micah didn't help much this year. He did hang out for a while in the swing and watched us work (well, he seemed more interested in the flower on the swing). And he did serenade us - he has recently taken up singing. so he provided us some entertainment. :)

(Note: The red toy in his hand - he held that most of the afternoon... even slept with it and when he woke up, was still clenching it in his fist... going to need to make sure we work on lessons about "sharing" someday!)