Easy Homemade Sauerkraut (Just Cabbage and Salt)
Real fermented sauerkraut with live cultures, made with just cabbage and salt using the simple 2% salt rule.
Ingredients
- 1 medium green cabbage about 2 lb / 900 g
- 1 tbsp non-iodized salt about 18 g sea or pickling salt, 2% of the trimmed cabbage weight
- 1 tsp caraway seeds optional
Instructions
- Remove 1–2 outer leaves and save one clean leaf. Quarter and core the cabbage, then slice it very thinly.
- Put the cabbage in a large bowl, sprinkle with the salt and massage firmly with clean hands for 5–10 minutes until it shrinks and releases a lot of brine.
- Pack the cabbage tightly into a clean 1-quart glass jar, pressing down hard after each handful. Pour in all the brine so the cabbage is completely submerged.
- Fold the saved cabbage leaf over the top and hold everything under the brine with a fermentation weight. Leave about 1 inch (2.5 cm) of headspace.
- Cover with a fermentation lid or loose lid and keep at 65–72°F (18–22°C) away from sunlight, on a plate to catch overflow.
- Every couple of days, press the cabbage back under the brine. Start tasting after 7 days. When it's as tangy as you like (usually 1–4 weeks), close the jar and refrigerate.
Notes
For accuracy, weigh the trimmed cabbage and use 2 g of salt per 100 g. Bubbles, cloudy brine and a sour smell are normal. Throw the batch out if you see fuzzy mold (blue, green, black or pink) or it smells rotten or feels slimy. When in doubt, throw it out. Ferment time shown is the minimum of 7 days. Nutrition values are estimates.