The Year We Made Sauerkraut
Source: The United Church of Canada Jubilee Album, 1926-2001,
Published by the Session, 2001.
By: Alex Sebe
The youth club decided it would help raise money for the new church building. The senior women agreed to cook the supper with our help. It was fall so we decided to have cabbage with pork and cabbage with sausage. Three of us volunteered to make sauerkraut in the church basement. Then the fun started.
One of the elder men brought us a forty-five gallon oak barrel. Someone else got us many bags of heads of cabbage. I brought the cabbage shredder from home. Saturday morning we cleaned, cored and cut each cabbage in half. After shredding, the cabbage had to be packed into the barrel with salt.
One of us had to get into the barrel to pack the cabbage. We got three straws and cut one short. The one who picked the short straw was to take off his shoes, socks, and pants, wash his feet to stomp the cabbage in the barrel. However, two of us switched the straws for three short ones. The third person was the first to pick. He got the short straw and prepared to get into the barrel. I think in the long run, he got the best deal. By the afternoon, the two of us were sore and exhausted from shredding all that cabbage.
We made space for the barrel in the room next to the stage where chairs were piled for storage. We finished packing the cabbage, covered the barrel with a tablecloth, and piled chairs high to hide the barrel of cabbage, and left it to ferment. The janitor who was in on this with us agreed to keep this a top secret. He looked after the fermentation, skimmed off the foam and washed and replaced the tablecloth.
The following week at the Sunday service, as was tradition then, women sat on the right facing the minister and the men on the left. There was a slight odour in the air. We noticed the women eyeing each other, wondering who was cooking cabbage for Sunday dinner.
The following Sunday, the smell of the cabbage was stronger. Members of the congregation were starting to ask questions and even reprimanded the janitor for cooking cabbage on Sunday in his apartment behind the sanctuary. He explained that he did not cook the cabbage and did not know where the odour was coming from.
After the church service, I noticed some of the elders checking the washrooms, hall and furnace room. They found nothing!
By the third week, even I had to admit that the church reeked of the fermenting cabbage, and the fun started. The elders again checked the building: sewers, toilets, kitchen garbage piles and every place they could think of. Finally, someone found the source of the odour; the barrel of sauerkraut behind the chairs.
The truth came out. I guess our enterprise was the main topic of conversation for that Sunday and the rest of the week.
We helped prepare the supper for the following Saturday. The odour coming from the kitchen was quite different and the supper was a great success. We announced that we had sauerkraut left over in the barrel and those interested could bring jars and we would sell what was left. After Sunday church service all the cabbage was sold. The Young People raised over $800.00 for the church, but we were told to never again make sauerkraut in the church basement.