That one guy who tasted my kraut and called it 'too clean'

Last fall at the farmers market in Portland, this older dude stopped at my stall, grabbed a sample of my 6 week caraway kraut, and chewed it like he was judging a wine competition. He swallowed, looked me dead in the eye, and said 'this is too clean, you're not letting the funk breathe.' I laughed it off at first, but it stuck with me for days. He explained that his grandma always left the crock slightly cracked so wild yeast could sneak in, and that her batch tasted like a wet basement in the best way. I tried his approach on my next batch, just a hair of air exposure, and honestly the difference was huge. Not saying he's right for everyone, but now I keep two crocks going, one clean and one dirty. Has anyone else had a stranger's offhand comment completely rewire their process?

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reese_lee12d ago

The crock cracked thing is wild, I had a similar moment with a pickle guy who told me to stop rinsing my cucumbers so aggressively because I was washing off the natural bloom that helps fermentation kick off. I thought he was nuts but I tried it with my next batch of dill spears and they came out way crunchier and with this deeper, almost grassy note that I couldn't get before. Now I'm doing the same thing you are, one jar sealed tight for the folks who want that crisp clean bite and one with a looser lid for my own weird experiments. It's funny how one random comment can just sit in your brain and turn into a whole new way of doing things, makes you wonder what other little tricks are floating around out there that we're all just missing.