Sauerkraut update

 Since the sauerkraut brine tasted really, really salty, I added about 1/2 cup of clean filtered water and stirred the whole mass together before weighing it down again with a stone mortar. Maybe all it needed was more time, but I was getting impatient. By day six, activity had definitely picked up, and it started to taste a little tangy. I decided to put the kraut into the fridge on day 8, when it was pleasantly sour, still crunchy and green. It could probably have used another day or two to be honest, but oh well. 

The Sauerkraut played a starring role in a recent Reuben loaf. I had two balls of mystery dough in the freezer which (thankfully) turned out to be pizza dough. I had a corned beef round that I pressure cooked and sliced thin, then layered this on top of the rolled out dough with Sauerkraut, thousand-island-ketchup-and-mayo, and shredded Swiss cheese (I had Gruyere). The dough was slashed along the toppings and folded over the top to create a basket-like loaf, and after rising for about 15 minutes, it was baked at 400 for about 25 minutes. That was a little slice of my childhood right there.