SC - keeping of saurkraut

[Stefan li Rous]

Adamantius replied to me with:
> Stefan li Rous wrote:
> > So are you saying that the saurkraut sold in the store today has
> > less pickling than that needed when used for preservation without
> > refrigeration? In that case, it would appear that the "modern"
> > saurkraut is not similar to period saurkraut and may be a poor
> > choice for one of our feasts.
> 
> No, I'm not saying that. The preservation of sauerkraut, like many such
> processes including the making of cheese,  is an ongoing process, and
> the fermentation can keep up for a long time. If you don't refrigerate
> fresh sauerkraut, such as that sold in bags or out of barrels in bulk,
> it will get soft and very sour indeed, as does kim chee and several
> other fermented cabbage preparations. That doesn't mean, though, that
> preferences have changed from a pre-refrigeration society to the
> present. Sauerkraut (or various other pickled vegetables) may well have
> been preferred fresher and milder in flavor during our period (which is
> probably why we seem to prefer it that way, too), but unlike a medieval
> farmer, we don't generally depend on our ability to preserve our crop.
> We can dump out that soft, sour kraut and get a new batch without
> looking back or worrying about starving.

Thanks for the clarification. I think this may bring up another question
on how we do our medieval food re-creations though. Namely:

Are we trying to re-create the medieval ideal of the way food ought
to be cooked, the perfect food?

Or are we trying to re-create medieval food as it really was?

If the former, then using modern saurkraut that has been refrigerated
and maybe with preservatives thus in a suspended state, maybe just the
thing to use.

If the latter, then while probably the easiest to do, presents a food
that is unlike what most medieval folks, including the upper, upper
echelon of society had. There has recently been some push for meals
that were seasonally consistant. This would seem to be another side
of this same issue.

I am not saying that is the way we need to go or even ought to go,
but I think it bears thinking about.
- -- 
THL Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
Mark S. Harris             Austin, Texas           stefan at texas.net
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