Fast and delicious veggie stew with garlic smoked sausage...

[Trueblue Texan]

Get your fiber and your flavor!

1 1/2 chopped onions
5 stalks celery sliced
2 carrots, sliced
1 turnip, cut in 1 inch cubes
1 pound Chappell Hill garlic smoked sausage, cut in 1/2 to 1 inch slices
chicken broth and water to cover the first 5 ingredients
2-3 russet potatoes, cut in 1 inch cubes
1/2 head cabbage coarsely chopped

Dump first 5 ingredients into dutch oven and boil. When carrots and turnips are almost tender, add potatoes and cabbage. Put the lid on and let it cook until everything is tender. Add salt and pepper to taste. Divine! Love it with sourdough bread! Bet it's great with cornbread as well!

[multigraincracker]

1. We eat a lot of cabbage soup.

The other veggies are what ever we got.
I also try to get some sour kraut in 3 or 4 days a week.

[Trueblue Texan]

2. Do you make your own sauerkraut?

I've made the salt fermented kind that's supposed to be so good for the gut, but I have difficulty getting the right amount of salt...mine is always too salty. I've got a friend from Ukraine who makes it just perfect--serves it with fresh parsley and toasted sesame oil--doesn't sound good but it is amazing. Of course, she doesn't know how much salt she uses...she says to me, "just don't put so much salt in."

[multigraincracker]

3. I've made it before,

but now I just the unprocessed kind in the dairy section.
Really cheap either way.
My go to snack is smoked salmon on a multigrain cracker topped with a little kraut and a little mustard.

[twodogsbarking]

4. I make kraut every other year. Have a 100 yo cabbage cutter and ten gallon crock.

Shred cabbage about a head at a time, salt, pound down, repeat until near full. Put weight on Sit for five wks or so out of light.
Inspect at times for mold, replace top leaves, skim off discolored. Salt weight about 2% of cabbage weight. Heat before canning, store where cool.
Give to friends. Tastes much better than anything you can buy. Learned from parents.

[Trueblue Texan]

6. Thanks for the salt/cabbage ratio!

Mine is not canned--that would kill the good bacteria. I make small batches. But I'll try the 2% salt/cabbage ratio and see if I can make it less salty.
Another kind of "ferment" thing I've been doing lately is to make a kind of slaw out of cruciferous veggies: broccoli, red and green cabbage, or whatever other crucifers you have on hand. Then I add red and yellow onions, julianned carrots, radishes, turnips, sliced celery--this makes a lot of slaw. I put it in jars in the fridge with a boiled dressing that I make for slaw. I serve it on my fresh greens at every meal. It's not truly fermented, like in salt, but you get lots of fiber by eating it as a dressing for fresh greens. It's really yummy and saves the work of cutting up a bunch of stuff for salads at every meal..

[twodogsbarking]

7. I am sure you use canning salt. Canning does as you stated. Sure tastes good though.

Stay well. Happy Valentine' Day.

[no_hypocrisy]

5. OK, you sold me!