Best Days to make sauerkraut

There are different traditions as to when the best days are to can or to make pickles or sauerkraut, and astrologers also have different interpretations. I believe that our astrologer goes by the dark of the Moon when the Moon is in the astrological sign of Cancer, Scorpio, or Pisces (water signs). She also looks at other factors. The dark of the Moon (waning) is between the full and new phases. So, for 2020, the full Moon was on November 30th, and the next one will be on Dec 29th. December 2 is during the dark of the Moon, and it also is when the Moon is in the astrological sign of Cancer, so that fits in with our astrologer’s interpretation of the best times. Looking at the previous dates (listed as of Oct 7), we have: Oct 9 (dark of the Moon, Cancer), Oct 10 (dark of the Moon, Cancer), Nov 5 (dark of the Moon, Cancer), and Nov 6 (dark of the Moon, Cancer). There are other traditions, however, that go by different astrological signs, such as those signs associated with the heart and above, especially the head (Aries). (Cancer is associated with the chest area, above Leo, the heart, so the dates above are acceptable by that tradition, too.) Some say that you should especially avoid dates when the Moon is in Virgo (sign of the bowels).

If you have your own tradition that you’d like to use, you can find the Moon’s astrological sign for each day on page 225 of The 2020 Old Farmer’s Almanac. The Moon phases can be found on the Left-Hand Calendar Pages for each month in the Almanac, or on Almanac.com at https://www.almanac.com/astronomy/moon/calendar. Hope this helps!

According to our astrologer, August 9 and 10 were the best days to can, pickle, or make sauerkraut for this month (August 2017). As to vinegar, the traditional way to make sauerkraut does not call for it (for a recipe, see: https://www.almanac.com/content/how-make-sauerkraut ), instead using natural fermentation, which gives it its tang similar to vinegar’s. Sauerkraut made in this way has lots of probiotics. However, many cooks do use vinegar in their recipe for flavor etc. — white vinegar works fine, although many prefer to use apple-cider vinegar. Sauerkraut made with vinegar may not have as much probiotics, etc., however. Some recipes that use vinegar are more like pickled than fermented sauerkraut.