Apple Ginger Carrot Kraut

Culinary Curiosity Thursday

It has the brief sour of a fresh kraut,
bite of ginger, melding melodic of cinnamon,
sweet/tart of apple,
a raisin depth and carrot crunch.
As my Granddad always said "Good Deal".

couldn’t leave it alone

I was reading through Fermented Veggies by Kirsten & Christopher Shockey, owning hundreds of cookbooks, and a short list of my workhorses, this will definitely be on that list. I glanced at their recipe for carrot kraut carrot cake, and was intrigued, cool idea. But I couldn’t leave it alone, and with all the apples in my house thought about making a carrot/apple/raisin/cinnamon kraut? Kinda riffing off the carrot cake idea, I thought after it fermented then I’d try making a cake out of it. Well, it fermented and exceeded my expectations, and it may become a favorite.
I developed the cake recipe and made it up last night, it worked but wasn’t completely what I wanted, meaning it just tasted like a good carrot cake, you’d never have known it was made with kraut. It used sorghum flour, potato starch, flax, butter, and only a ⅓ of the regular sugar in carrot cake. But, the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to know that it was made with kraut, and I didn’t want it to be so sweet. By the way, if you do want a sweet carrot kraut cake, just substitute pound per pound of kraut for grated carrot in your C.C. favorite recipe.
I put the leftover carrot kraut cake into the food dehydrator, because I’m into making rusks out of everything this week. It smells wonderful as I type. I've already gone ahead and mixed up a sourdough carrot kraut bread with rye. It’ll be ready to bake tomorrow, and if it turns out I’ll write it up. My recipe idea started with rye, sour, yet apples, in a bread so it didn’t have to feel like it had to be sweet. I hope it works, kinda looking forward to it.

Serve carrot kraut as a side salad to people who don’t think they like kraut

Fermented Veggies Recommended book
Fermentista Good fermentation site by the same people

Apple/Ginger/Carrot Kraut

Makes 2 quarts
Ferment time at room temperature is about three days
Ingredients
3 lbs/1.42 kg grated carrots
1 ½ lbs/589g small dice chopped cooking apples
1 tablespoon/17g sea salt
1 cup/115g raisins
1 teaspoon/2.6g cinnamon
2 tablespoons/10g fresh ginger grated

Instructions
Grate carrots I use a food processor
Chop apples I used local McIntosh from old friend’s trees.
Add carrots, apples, raisins, spice and salt to a large mixing bowl
Massage the mixture with your bare beautiful hands, singing blessings, thinking good thoughts, and being grateful for the wonders of fermentation.
If you do this correctly the juices will begin to run, a miracle.
I use a ½ gallon mason jar but any big jar or crock will work
Put kraut mix in by the handful and using your fist
press and pack it into the jar, continue until it’s all in and the brine from the packing covers the carrots and apples.
Leave two inches of headroom at the top
The mantra is: “Under the brine doing fine” meaning as long as the veggies are covered in brine they are happy, safe, content and fermenting.
Tuck a grape leaf, or cabbage leaf over the veggies, tuck-tuck like a child for bed.
Set a jelly jar on top and press down pushing the brine to the top of the mason jar.
Set a bowl under the jar to catch any drips or spills
Put your fermenting kraut in a cool room temperature out of direct sunlight
Check it after three days, or everyday it’s ok if you’re the fussy type.
It’s done when it tastes pleasantly sour, instead of salty.
Repack into smaller jars, making sure some brine covers the top
It should last several months or longer in the fridge, but it won’t, it’s so good.
I made my ½ gallon a on Saturday and it’s already half gone.