This spicy, tart and juicy Christmas Kraut is a match made in heaven for your plate, throughout the holiday season.

Traditional Christmas foods are naturally rich in fats, nutrients and, of course, sugar! Many of us will also be enjoying a tipple or two at parties over the coming weeks. Adding a fermented aspect to these meals, this Christmas Kraut may help the body to deal with and digest all these excess foods and drinks. Hopefully lessening the fatigue, bloating, hangovers, sugar highs (and lows) and of course the noxious fumes that generally comes with turkey, sprouts et al.
Perfect on the plate at the main event or served with cheese, this Christmas Kraut will totally change some of your Christmas traditions!! It will certainly be on the menu for me for years to come.
So simple, if you are in a warmish climate you could ferment this in a week and have it ready for your Christmas table this year.
To find out how to make a basic sauerkraut see here and for my beetroot and ginger flavour see here.


- Ingredients
- 1 whole green cabbage thinly sliced
- 1 whole red cabbage thinly sliced
- 1.5% Salt
- 250g of fresh cranberries cut in half
- 1 orange (zest and segments cut in 3)
- 2tsp Pumpkin pie spice (or use a mix of cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, ginger and star anise)
- Retain 1/2 of the outside cabbage leaves for later.
- Make sauerkraut by mixing the cabbage with the salt. Massage the cabbage until it starts to wilt and release water.
- Add and combine the cranberries, orange and spices.
- Press the mixture into a fido (airtight sealable jar) jar and keep pressing down to release liquid.
- When the mixture is all in the jar and there is liquid covering the top, press down the outside cabbage leaves to keep any stray bits of cabbage from floating to the surface of the liquid.
- Seal and leave to ferment on the counter for a week-28 days. Keep tasting the kraut every few days.
- Put in the fridge for an additional week.
- Enjoy, Merry Christmas
- This recipe is especially nice with cheese or an alternative to cranberry sauce.
