Kathy Schwinghammer wrote:
>
> How come sauerkraut isn't paleo?  Isn't cabbage paleo?
> I think most sauerkraut has vinegar in it, but I found some in the health
> food store that says it's just "cabbage, salt, and spices."

Erik Hill wrote:
>
> The sauerkraut that I use has only those ingredients that I listed, but
> I still don't believe it's paleo (though I will still eat it).  Because
> vinegar is created in the process of fermentation (even though it isn't
> used as an ingredient) and because the salt, while quite low compared to
> most modern foods, is much higher than one might be expected to find in
> most wild, unchanged food and meat.  Personally, it actually seems to
> improve my health so I use it.

Real sauerkraut *is* just cabbage, salt, and spices. It's not
fermentation process which would involve yeast producing alcohol or
vinegar. It is brine pickling, which involves lactobacilli producing
lactic acid, not acetic acid, as far as I know. Cordain and others have
a lot of references to the negative effects of salt as well as its
scarceness in paleo times, but we still make and eat some sauerkraut
while generally staying pretty low-sodium.

Hilary McClure
Danville, Vermont