Every year when the weather gets cold, I buy a few Chinese cabbages to pickle Northeastern sauerkraut. Although I am not from the Northeast, I am very interested in many foods from the Northeast, such as sauerkraut, sticky bean buns, rice porridge, and Northeast blood sausage. Except for Northeastern blood sausage, which I can’t make, I have made the other kinds many times. I have a long history of pickling Northeastern sauerkraut, more than ten years now. I live in a building and don’t have a tank, so I use mineral water bottles, and sometimes glass bottles.

Some people pickle sauerkraut, but halfway through the process, the sauerkraut will grow white or black hairs, or the cabbage will rot, which is time-consuming and labor-intensive and cannot be eaten. In fact, pickling Northeastern sauerkraut is very simple. I will share my method with you. A few Chinese cabbages, a handful of salt and a few bottles can solve the problem. It doesn't grow hairy or rotten. It can be eaten after being marinated for 30 days. It is golden and sour. It is very delicious when used to stew pork ribs, pork belly, or make dumplings stuffed with pickled cabbage. It is appetizing and goes well with rice.

It’s not too late to pickle now. You only need to pickle it for 30 days before you can eat it. The method is simple and easy to succeed, but it is not so easy to fail. A simple pickling method for Northeastern sauerkraut

Ingredients: Chinese cabbage, salt.

Specific methods:

1. When buying Chinese cabbage, try to choose varieties with thinner stems. Also, when pickling this Northeastern sauerkraut, we do not use the green leaves. Otherwise, the golden color will not appear when pickled.

2. After talking about cabbage, let’s talk about utensils. Everything that is used, such as cutting boards, knives, basins, bottles, etc., must be cleaned and there must be no oil stains. If the sauerkraut is stained with oil, it will go bad. I use a good quality mineral water bottle. The bottle should also be cleaned and drained for later use.

3. Cut the Chinese cabbage into thin strips, put it into a basin, add slightly more salt than the cold salad, stir evenly, and let it marinate for about two hours until the water is released. Some people will say, don’t you wash the Chinese cabbage? No need to wash, peel off the outer layers of leaves, only the cabbage inside is left, no need to wash when pickling, we will wash it when we eat. In fact, the inner part of Chinese cabbage is not dirty. When we eat Chinese cabbage, the inner part is rarely washed.

4. When the cabbage is pickled and the water is released, and the cabbage is soft and can be bent without breaking, we put the shredded cabbage (do not squeeze out the water) into the mineral water bottle, which is up to 9 minutes full. Be sure to leave some space. You can pour some of the pickled cabbage juice into the bottle, or you don't need to use it, either way.

5. When stuffing cabbage, you can use chopsticks to press while stuffing. This will allow you to stuff more cabbage, make it firmer, and help with subsequent fermentation.

6. After installation, close the bottle cap tightly, place the bottle in a place away from direct sunlight, and let it ferment naturally for 30 days. After 30 days, it can be eaten. Of course, I mean edible. It is not eaten directly, but used for further cooking. Please feel free to stew pork ribs or pork belly.

1. Pickled food will produce a large amount of nitrite. The nitrite content will be reduced to the lowest after being pickled for 30 days. Therefore, this sauerkraut must be pickled for 30 days. Eat again. Some people eat pickled foods. As long as they are pickled to taste, they can eat them at any time. This is very unhealthy and must be corrected.

2. Regarding the issue of room temperature, as long as it will not freeze, the temperature has little impact. Therefore, whether you are in the north with heating or the south without heating, as long as the cabbage in this bottle will not freeze Just freeze it into ice, then safely put it indoors and let it ferment. If the bottle is overfilled, you have to be careful about the bottle exploding.