Second Frost Farm Kraut
The Kraut
It started with a few cabbages and couple of hand fulls of fresh dill, our yearly batch of the household kraut we called Dilly Kraut. In 2023 we decided to renovate the barn kitchen, formally used by the previous owners for cheese making, and add household favorite, Dilly Kraut, to our vegetable offerings at the weekly Farmers’ Markets. A few years, several thousand pounds of shredded cabbage, and a good deal of recipe testing later we now have 9 varieties or kraut offered at our farmers’ markets and a select few retail locations in mid-coast Maine. Our process remains simple, we shred cabbage grown here on the farm and mix in the abundance of fresh vegetables we grow as they come into season, toss with salt and let time and microbes take it from there. No sugar, no vinegar, no preservative. We like our krauts crunchy and full of flavor and we think you will too. Oh yeah, have you kraut is really, really good for you?
Classic Kraut: Just cabbage and sea salt doing its thing. Crunchy, tangy and a touch of natural sweetness. Great on it’s own, jazzing up a grilled cheese or alongside your bangers and mash. Ingredients: organic cabbage, sea salt
Dilly Kraut: The kraut that started it all. We pack this one with many, many, many hand fulls or fresh, hand chopped dill. Open the lid and fragrance hits you from the jump. We always have a jar of this in our fridge and it goes with just about anything- a turkey sandwich? you bet. Haddock Rueben? Of course! Spaghetti and meatballs? Seriously, give it a try, it’s delish. Ingredients: organic cabbage, organic dill, sea salt.
Pickle Kraut: The gateway kraut for many. We created pickle kraut because we couldn’t keep a purely lacto-fermented pickle from gettin mushy after a few months in the fridge. To solve this pickle of a problem we took our garlicky sour pickle recipe and shredded into the cabbage vat. The results don’t disappoint, it’s a fork full of super crunchy shredded sour pickle. Your burgers new best friend, the kraut dog your subconscious knew you always wanted, the midnight snack that you can actually tell your PCP about. Ingredients: organic cabbage, organic cucumbers, organic dill, organic garlic, sea salt
Golden Turmeric Kraut: Because Kraut is so delicious it easy to forget that it’s also really healthy. This kraut really drives home the health food point without missing a beat on the tasty scale. Organic cabbage, organic carrots, organic golden beets, sea salt, organic turmeric, organic black pepper
Ginger Carrot Kraut: Ginger carrots also started a household staple, altough, in those days it was carrot sticks in gingery saltwater brine. Delicious? Yes. Mushy in a few months? Yes. The magic of cabbage to the rescue and this super carroty, super gingery kraut will stay crunchy in your fridge all year but if it lasts that long you must have forgotten it was there. Put this one on your friend rice, your $.59 ramen bowl, your fancy dinner party ramen bowl or just straight from the jar. Organic cabbage, organic carrots, organic ginger, sea salt
Garlic Chili Kraut: Sriracha shaped like kraut. We use hot wax peppers. They aren’t crazy crazy hot which means we can pack a ton of them into each batch and get big pepper flavor without blowing the average Mainer’s palette to smithereens. Loads of garlic too even though its a pain to peel that much garlic. If you put hot sauce on it you can put Garlic Chili Kraut on it, Egg sandwich, burrito bowl, you get the idea. Ingredients: organic cabbage, organic chili peppers, organic garli, sea salt
Roasted Poblano and Jalapeno Kraut: This one recently won the judges award for best fermented food at Common Ground. We were told after the fact that commercial producers weren’t allowed to enter but our crew member that we sent to pick up the jar just grabbed the big blue ribbon and ran. We’ll call that win too. Heaps or fire roasted poblano and jalapeno peppers are the backbone of this smoky full flavored kraut. I wouldn’t recommend eating a taco, a pupusa, or plate of nachos without it. Ingredients: organic cabbage, organic carrots, organic fire roasted poblano peppers, organic red onion, organic fire roasted jalapeno peppers, sea salt.
RUBY KRAUT: The prettiest of all the krauts and for us the earthiest. Red cabbage gets company from red beets to really drive the “there’s no place home” narrative. We add pears from our orchard to lend a sweetness to all the earth tones and a touch of thyme round things out. Really, really good on mash potatoes or a beef stew. Organic red cabbage, organic beets, organic pears, organic thyme, sea salt