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Ever wondered how to can Sauerkraut so you can enjoy it all winter long? Recently I wrote about our Cabbage harvest and using some of it to make Sauerkraut. Water bath canning Sauerkraut is pretty easy; a beginning canner can preserve cabbage with confidence.
It’s an easy way to preserve some cabbage and Graham loves it along with perogies and sausages. Read here to see how to make your own Sauerkraut.
After leaving the kraut in the crock for a couple of weeks and checking it often, I scooped some out for Graham to do a taste test. He found it to be delicious and mild, which he likes.
That meant it was time to finish off the preserving of the Sauerkraut. If we wanted to, we could just put the crock down in our Cold Room and use the Sauerkraut when we wanted some. We keep our Cold Room between 32 and 40F, and this temperature would be fine for the Sauerkraut.
However, we chose to can it instead – so should you if you cannot keep the crock in a cool enough place. Here’s how I did it.
Water bath canning for homemade Sauerkraut
Heat the Sauerkraut – you want it to gently simmer, don’t boil it. Add a bit of the juice. Make a brine, in case you don’t have enough juice in the crock.
You’re going to Hot Water Bath the Sauerkraut, so wash your jars and then set them into your boiling water canner. Keep them in there for 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, get your seals and rings ready. Pour boiling water over them and let them sit until you need them. I’m using Tattler lids for some of the jars – I should have ordered more!
Use 1 1/2 tablespoons of salt for each 1 quart of water. Heat this brine on the stove.
Once you get your Sauerkraut warmed up, hot pack it into jars. I use pint jars but you can use quarts if you like.
Leave 1/2 inch of headroom in the jars. Add the warm liquid and use the brine, if you need to. Leave 1/2 inch of headroom and wipe the tops of each jar.
If you are using Tattler lids and seals, there is a slightly different process to follow and you can read it here. It is very important to let the contents vent during the processing.
Place your jars in the Boiling Water Bath and once the water comes back to a boil, set your timer for 15 minutes for pints. If I had used quarts, the processing time would be 25 minutes.
I have to add 5 minutes because of our altitude (2800 ft). Make sure you always take your elevation into account when you do canning, it is very important.
Once the time is up, remove your jars and leave them alone for 24 hours. After that, you can wipe the jars down, remove the metal bands if you like, and place the jars on your pantry shelf.
I have a very handy Canning kit (Presto) that includes jar lifter, seal grabber, a funnel, a measuring gauge that allows you to easily figure out the headspace and more.
These items are almost a necessity when canning. You can order one of these Canning kits here.
Enjoy your Sauerkraut! Graham has already enjoyed a meal of Bratwurts and Sauerkraut along with Perogies, and is looking forward to many more.
We ended up with 17 pints of Sauerkraut using a 3 gallon crock, which held a total of 15 pounds of cabbage.
Linda says
I love homemade sauerkraut, but really detest the store bought version… thanks for sharing how you do it.
Annie says
The other day, I noticed Sauerkraut in the grocery store – $3.85 for a small jar, roughly the size of the pint jars. I had no clue it was that expensive – it is only Cabbage!
Linda says
It’s pretty amazing that it can be that expensive. I don’t think sauerkraut is as popular as it once was, so now it is a ‘specialty’ item…