Time to Make Sauerkraut

We have red and white cabbage ready to harvest. Both varieties make good sauerkraut. Red cabbage makes a deep magenta sauerkraut. Mixing white and red, of course, makes pink sauerkraut. 

We like sauerkraut, but we don't care for the vinegary, mushy, stringy kind found in the market in cans or jars. Store-bought, canned sauerkraut has been pasteurized and therefore, the good bacteria (probiotic) and enzymes have been destroyed as has the vitamin C, and other goodies.

We make our own for the better nutrition, but mostly because we like it. It is a little bit sour, and the cabbage is still crisp and tastes like cabbage. If you like sauerkraut at all, or cabbage, once you see how easy it is to make, you'll want to try making some yourself. Once you taste this sauerkraut, you'll want to make some more.

At harvest time, we make a big batch in a crock, but we also make small batches in quart jars when we can find good, organic cabbage (on sale) in the market. Non-organic cabbage that has been sprayed to kill insects or weeds may be slow to ferment or not ferment at all. We use either green or red cabbage or a combination of the two. Here are some fermentation crock options.

All you need to make your own small batch is a head of cabbage, some sea salt, a quart jar with a tight fitting lid, a sturdy bowl, and something with which to pound the cabbage, like a wooden meat tenderizing mallet.

Here's a simple recipe from Nourishing Traditions (page 92):

Sauerkraut

Makes 1 quart

1 medium cabbage, cored and shredded
1 tablespoon caraway seeds
1 tablespoon sea salt
4 tablespoons whey (if not available, use an additional 1 tablespoon salt)

In a bowl, mix cabbage with caraway seeds, sea salt and whey. Pound with a wooden pounder or a meat hammer for about 10 minutes to release juices. Place in a quart-sized, wide-mouth mason jar and press down firmly with a pounder or meat hammer until juices come to the top of the cabbage. The top of the cabbage should be at least 1 inch below the top of the jar. Cover tightly and keep at room temperature for about 3 days before transferring to cold storage. The sauerkraut may be eaten immediately, but improves with age.

Notes: We don't always add the caraway seeds. You can easily make your own whey and in the process, sour cream, or cream cheese. See Making Whey.

Here is an excerpt from a great little book on making sauerkraut and other lacto-fermented veggies we recommend:

"Attention was focused on the nutritional importance of sauerkraut when, in the 18th century, sailors often suffered from scurvy, a vitamin C deficiency. Captain Cook sailed around the world, carrying barrels of sauerkraut, not losing a single man to scurvy during his three-year voyage"

From Making Sauerkraut and Pickled Vegetables at Home: Creative Recipes for Lactic Fermented Food to Improve Your Health (Natural Health Guide), pg. 9.

Remember:  Unlike some others on the Internet, we will never, ever, ever recommend a book, product, practice, or process that we ourselves have not purchased or used consistently and with good, consistent results.

Mini-Ecosystems on Our Mini-Farm

At our place, when our mini-ecosystems are running as they should, the goats, chickens, ducks, worms, catfish and tilapia, all work together to feed each other and us humans.

The chickens like to get to the fresh goat manure as soon as it comes out of the goat. They peck it open to get to undigested seeds and, we presume, parasites. In the process, the chickens scratch to turn the manure into the straw bedding of the goat pen. Thanks to the chickens the composting bacteria begin their work even before we muck out the pen.

The straw and manure from the pen go to one of several compost bins or piles until the composting action cools. In the meantime, we dump kitchen scraps on top of these piles and let the chickens and ducks have at them. They add manure to the piles as the chickens scratch and turn the compost, speeding the decomposition.

 

From there the cooled, but not necessarily completed compost goes either to the garden as mulch or to the worm bin to become vermicompost (worm castings). The worms go to feed the fish, ducks, and chickens. Most of vermicompost goes to the garden, some goes as tea to feed the duckweed, while a bucketful (with worms) goes to the bottom of the empty compost bin ready to receive more muck from the goats.

The fish eat the duckweed, and in moderation and for variety the following: garden and kitchen scraps, chicken and duck manure (and the flora these encourage), worms, chopped offal from the duck and chicken butchering, and raw scrambled eggs.

The ducks and chickens receive the fish offal, greens from garden and the aquaponic grow beds, and duckweed (the ducks like it wet, the chickens like it dry).

Solid fish waste is filtered out of the fish tanks to feed the garden and to help heat up the compost as needed.

Goats get leafy greens from the garden and aquaponic beds.

The humans keep it all moving and healthy. In return we get veggies, fruits, nuts, herbs, eggs, milk, meat, and fish.

Time to Start Seeds Indoors and Out

It’s time to plan our Spring garden. For some gardeners, planning is about all that can be done until the weather warms up. For us, the last frost is expected in mid March or early April.

The first decision to make in garden planning is what to grow. All plants are easy to grow if you know how. Our advice is that you grow only what you plan to eat. If you don't eat beets, don't grow them--at least at first (beets are very good for you, by the way). Start with a few things that you consistently buy at the produce market. Tomatoes are the most popular home-grown vegetable, but if you don't eat tomatoes don't grow them. (A tomato is actually a fruit, but defined by the government for tax purposes as a vegetable; see Nix v. Hedden)

Knowing how long your plants need to mature will help you know when to start them in the garden. Seed packets and catalogs usually give the number of days to harvest from the time you transplant the seedling into the garden. So you work backwards from the time you want to harvest your crops, keeping in mind the frost-free date. 

To raise transplants from seed--like tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, etc.--find out how long the seed needs to germinate (also found on the seed packet or in the catalog) along with the number of days or weeks required for the seedling to be ready to transplant (usually four to six weeks). Add these together and using a calendar, work backwards from your frost-free date. 

Organic Gardening Magazine has a chart to help with your calculations here.

Here is our schedule for starting seeds indoors. Our target date for setting out plants is the first week in April (the last expected frost). This year we're a little behind schedule for some plants, like peppers, eggplant, and lettuce (all of which should have been started two weeks ago). This week, we'll be planting seeds for:

• Peppers and Eggplant -- 8 to 12 weeks before the last frost.
• Lettuce -- 8 to 12 weeks before the last frost.  Lettuces can be transplanted into the garden a month or so before the last frost.
• Cole crops (Broccoli, Cauliflower, Cabbage) -- 6 to 8 weeks before the last frost. These can be transplanted into the garden two weeks or so before the last frost.
• Tomatoes -- 4 to 6 weeks before the last frost.
• Cucumbers and Melons -- 2 to 4 weeks before the last frost. That would be the first part of March. These are transplanted out two weeks or more after the last frost. 

We like to grow our plants from seed for at least two reasons. First, we can more easily get seeds for the varieties we want to grow (Pennsylvania Dutch Crookneck Squash, for example). Second, we choose open pollinated and heirloom varieties (not usually available from the nurseries as transplants) so that we can save seeds from year to year. 

However, if you are new to gardening, you may want to wait until the weather warms up and buy plants from the nurseries or garden shops. Nurseries tend to stock only tried-and-true varieties. These will be ready to set out in the garden, are disease resistant, suited to your area, and in most cases will not appear on store shelves until it is time to plant them, give or take a couple of weeks, depending on the weather (frost). If you choose to start seeds, we suggest you start with varieties that germinate easily: basil, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, chives, leeks, lettuce, onions, peppers, and tomatoes. 

Our favorite online seed catalogs:

Seed Savers Exchange http://www.seedsavers.org/

Territorial Seed Company http://www.territorialseed.com/

Both of these offer printed catalogs available upon request. 

Territorial Seed Co. has pretty good online "Growing Guides" for each variety of veggie. Although just about every online or print seed catalog offers information on how to grow various varieties, some have more detailed information than others. Park Seeds (http://parkseed.com/vegetables/c/vegetables/) has on most of their detail pages a "Growing Information" tab that offers planting and growing instructions, tips, special considerations, potential pests and solutions, and so on for each variety.

Our favorite book on starting plants from seed is The New Seed Starter's Handbook by Nancy Bubel. It's main sections include: Starting Seeds Indoors, Moving Plants Outdoors, Special Techniques and Situations, Saving Seeds and Making Further Plans, and an Encyclopedia of Plants to Grow from Seed (the info you need to grow each variety of garden plant). 

Starting Seeds Indoors

1. Gather your materials. Get your seed flats, milk cartons cut in half down the middle, small pots, or what ever it is you're going to plant your seeds in. You'll also need some potting soil or seed starter soil mix (recommended over potting soil), or make your own mix with equal parts sharp sand, peat moss, and perlite or vermiculite.
2. Prepare your work space. Put down some newspaper or other suitable cover on your work surface. You're going to spill some potting soil.
3. Review seed packets and make labels for your plantings. Popsicle sticks, strips cut from plastic milk jugs, ready made labels from the garden store, or simply a label taped on the side of the flat will do. Oh, and don't forget your seeds. If you're new to starting seeds and identifying seedlings, labels are must. If you have lots of garden experience, you'll know that a super-hot pepper plant looks the same as a mild-hot pepper plant. It is very easy to confuse plantings in similar looking flats or pots. Labels are a must.
4. Prepare the medium. Use a watering can or a spray bottle to moisten the potting soil or seed starting mix. It should be damp to the touch but not soggy. If you start with moist soil, you will not have to water your seeds once you after you plant them. There is enough moisture in the soil to sprout the seeds. If you are planting very fine seeds, even the finest mist can dislodge your seeds and cause them all to clump together in the corners and along the edges, making separating the seedlings for replanting difficult if not impossible.



Containers to use for starting seeds indoors. Some ready-
made, some re-purposed.

5. Prepare the containers.  Remember this planting is only temporary. As soon as your seedlings have their second set of leaves, you can move them to individual pots or packs (although you could start with these keeping in mind that they will use more starting mix). Fill your container with moistened starter mix and press it down gently. Top it off and press again so that the mix is within a half inch of the top.  Airflow, and in some cases light, is important to seed germination. A planting surface too far below the rim of the container can interfere with these.
6. Plant the seeds. If you're using a small container (like the bottom two inches of a plastic milk jug), you can scatter the seeds over the entire surface of the planting medium. If you're using a nursery flat, you can place the seeds on the surface in rows, spacing the seeds according to size (tiny seeds at least an eighth of an inch apart, medium seeds a half inch, and large seeds an inch). Remember that you are going to be transplanting the seedlings later. Separating the roots of seedlings planted too close together can be difficult if not impossible without damaging the plant. If you're using a pack with cells, put a couple of seeds in each cell. The extras can be thinned later by snipping them off with small scissors.
7. Cover the seeds. Except for the very finest seeds or those few varieties that need light to germinate (the seed packet or catalog will tell) which can simply be pressed into the medium, the seeds will need to be covered with more starting medium. A general rule of thumb is to cover the seed to a depth 3 to 4 times its size. For example, a seed that is one-eighth inch in size would be covered with three-eighths to one-half inches of cover. We tend to stay toward the shallower depth when starting seeds indoors. This cover layer of mix or vermiculite does not need to be wet. It will absorb water from the moist layer below. You will not have to water your seeds until after they sprout. There will be plenty of moisture available for them.
8. Cover the container. If you're using ready-made seed starting trays, put the covers on and your seeds are ready to go. If you're using re-purposed containers, you can place a piece of damp newspaper or burlap over the surface of your container. Or (our favorite), you can slip the whole container into a plastic bag, or use a plastic sheet (trash bag), tucking the edges under your container. You could possibly use aluminum foil, but we have never tried this. Clear plastic allows you to see what is happening without letting out the moisture around your seeds.
9. Put the container in a warm place. Your seeds have moisture and they will need warmth to germinate. Put the covered container in a warm place, but keep it out of the sun! You don't want to steam your seeds or new seedlings. The top of the fridge might be a good place. Near the stove in the kitchen. A shelf over the dryer in the laundry room or a shelf near the water heater. We've sprouted seedlings on the dining room table and on the patio table (in warm weather). Most seeds will sprout more quickly at temperatures between about 72 and 86 degrees, but have a good germination rate at around 70. In other words, a comfortable temperature for you will be good for your seeds.
10. Watch and wait. As soon as most of the seedlings emerge, they will need their plastic tent removed and to be moved to a sunny place, not necessarily in direct sunlight at first. In a future post, we'll talk about what happens next.   

Easy Crops to Grow

If you've never tried gardening before, and want to give it a try, but you just don't know how to get started, we have a suggestion for you: Start by growing something you really like to eat! Find out what the requirements are for that veggie or fruit and see what you would need to grow it in your current situation--will grow indoors? in a container on the patio or balcony? in a small garden bed with or with out vertical support? And so on. Some plants will be more difficult than others. Here are a few of the easier ones that adapt well to smaller spaces:
 

Tomatoes are America's number one favorite to grow. There’s nothing like a just-picked, perfectly ripe tomato. They are especially easy when you start from plants. If you get that bumper crop, they're easy to store: can, freeze, or dry them.

Spinach is a cool season crop that can be planted in very early spring, late fall, or in our part of the world, even in winter. Don’t get greedy and wait for the leaves to get their biggest--they will probably be bitter. Cut off the outer leaves while they are still young for sweeter spinach and a longer harvest--the inner leaves will continue to produce.

Green beans are quite easy to grow and will give you a big crop (if you grow the pole varieties)! If you grow more than you can eat fresh, they freeze well. They're going to need a tripod or trellis to grow on, but they don't take up a lot of horizontal space in the garden.

Onions grow well in well-drained, loose, soil rich in nitrogen; a container or raised bed is perfect. Mulch will help retain moisture and discourage  weeds.

Strawberries are surprisingly hardy and are unbelievably sweet when they are perfectly ripe. This perennial needs full sun and to be keep well-weeded.

Peppers can be ripened for different lengths of time to get a range of colors and flavors. They all start out green and turn colors (red for most varieties) as they ripen.

Carrots and Beets -- root vegetables that thrive in loose, well-drained soil. They will take a while to mature, but they are worth it. They like sun.

Radishes grow well in the cool seasons and do well even in soil that isn’t the greatest. The germinate quickly and some varieties are ready to harvest in three weeks after sprouting. Kids and adults with patience issues do well with these. However, if you don't care for them in your salad, don't grow too many if any.