GUIDED MEDITATION SCRIPT:
1. CUT / INTRO (15min)
> Put meditative music on
Welcome to our Sauerkraut workshop and welcome to our joint contemplative and speculative practice today.
Today's intention for our time together is to help the mind find peace and balance and especially to help ourselves cope with the uncertainty of our world at this time and letting us imagine a future through sauerkraut.
The workshop will consist of five steps of Sauerkraut making, also noted under recipe in the booklet. The steps will be: Cutting, Kneading, Botteling, Fermenting and Labeling.
Now let us begin today by finding a comfortable position in the kitchen. In front of you the half cabbage, a knife, a board, salt and a jar.
If you have questions during the meditation, write them in the chat. Though don't worry too much, trust your intuition, there is not much to do wrong here.
Close your eyes and take both your hands. Place them upon your cabbage. Take a deep breath in and listen to your own heart beating in your chest.
Open your eyes again. Now remove two outer leaves, put them aside as we'll use them later. Take a deep breath in through your nose, now a long exhalation out. Now cut your cabbage in quarters as we already halved them for you and then slice out the core. Now you want to slice it as thinly as you like, the thinner it is, the easier our next steps will be. If you have a Mandoline, go ahead and use it.
While you are cutting your cabbage in thin slices feel your breath, feel your body and listen to the history of sauerkraut.
History Input:
Fermenting food is a technique that has been practiced in different regions of the world for a long time.
It’s the original superfood.
In ancient China, pickled cabbage was valued as a power food for heavy workers. Rice and soured cabbage also fed the workers building the Great Wall of China in the 3rd century BC. In Korea the resembling fermented cabbage dish, Kimchi, also dates back more than 2000 years ago. Mongolian migratory tribes might have eventually brought the knowledge of soured cabbage to Europe.
However, it is also possible that the sauerkraut tradition originated in ancient Rome and Greece, where they praised the merits of soured cabbage as well. The Greek physician and philosopher Hippocrates (466 to 377 BC) already described sauerkraut as a healing and healthy food.
In the middle of the 18th century, natural scientists recognized the effect of sauerkraut against the dreaded scurvy, which often carried off the miserably fed crews on ships. The circumnavigator James Cook (1728 to 1779) took 60 barrels of sauerkraut, each containing one ton, on board and brought his crew back without any losses from scurvy.
Since the raw material cabbage is easy to grow in large quantities, and the end product sauerkraut is very inexpensive, has a long shelf life, is healthy and can be transported without special precautions, it was soon used to feed large groups of people.
In 1804, the Parisian chef François Nicolas Appert succeeded in inventing sterilization by heating. From then on, Napoleon's Grand Armée carried cooked cabbage in jars and soldered tin cans in addition to sauerkraut in barrels. This process was adopted by rival powers, and sauerkraut became an important provision for armies in wartime Europe.
Especially during World War II, the stereotyping term Krauts für Deutsche (or Kraut for German) was frequently used in the English-speaking world, which was probably due to the traditionally high consumption of sauerkraut during the winter months in Central Europe, especially in Germany.
Until now soured cabbage is an essential part of traditional central and eastern-european cooking.
> How are your sliced cabbages doing? Let’s proceed to the next step – the kneading.
2. KNEADING
While we guide you to the second part of the meditation, put the cabbage in a large pot, put salt on top, you'll need about 2% of the weight of the cabbage in salt – for a half cabbage that is around 1-2 tabelspoons, making 10g – and start kneading it with your hands or your fists.
When producing sauerkraut you are to stamp it in a regular manner over a period of time of at least 5 minutes. If it is done in groups there is maybe chatter accompanying it, if not it may be done in silence. Maybe the chatter of the group has also worn off. The rhythm of kneading and stamping can be timed on a metronom. Trying to be as exact and as rythmical as possible, can be an enjoyable sensation. Doing it together creates a contemplative communal rhythm.
Take a deep breath in. Take the salt and put it on top of the cabbage. Now press your fingers together and form a fists creating a seal of energy within your hand. Take a deep breath in and a deep breath out. When you feel ready, start the kneading. All right you really want to get in there and crush it and squeeze it. You want to get the liquid to release as much as possible. Don't worry about bruising it, because that's kind of the whole point here. You're gonna need to do that for about 5-10 minutes, take a break if needed and just simply observe how long it takes for the liquid to cover your cabbage slices, it will eventually happen, so be patient. By pounding the cabbage, we want to make sure we can get as much of that liquid out as possible. Simply stay present noticing the movement of your breath as you breathe in and out begin to notice any sensations in your body feeling the coolness of the air coming into your nostrils as you breathe in and then the warmth of the air leaving your nostrils as you breathe out. Notice if you begin to feel any tingling sensations in your fingers or your toes whatever you are experiencing right now, notice the rythm you produce, let it be the thing that guides you, be the watcher of the experience itself allow yourself to find peace enjoy in this simple moment of silence and disconnection you deserve.
Now as we continue to go deeper and dive further into our inner exploration let's focus on the third eye chakra or
the center between your two eyebrows. Notice how you feel right. Now don't let your mind win. The ego may get in the way
making you doubt yourself. Make you want to stop. But simply pay no attention to that negative energy. Notice it. Be aware of it and then take a breath and confirm to yourself that you are in control and keep on kneading the cabbage. Take another deep breath in exhale as you let it go. As you're allowing yourself to go deeper let's introduce a beautiful and powerful mantra that you can repeat or come back to any time the mind or ego begins to get in the way. Repeating this mantra as many times as you need and truly seeing it with conviction and love to yourself. As I surrender to the uncertainty, I knead the cabbage. I am safe. And I am guided. Inhale, exhale. As I surrender to the uncertainty, I knead the cabbage. I am safe. And I am guided. As I surrender to the uncertainty, I knead the cabbage. I am safe. And I am guided. Focus on breath, on the mantra, on the cabbage. As I surrender to the uncertainty I knead the cabbage. I am safe. And I am guided.
Stay in this moment of stillness and peace as you repeat this mantra as many times as you need.
> Silence while music is playing.
The time has come and we are finished with the kneading step. We will try to elevate to the next step now: The Botteling.
> End metronomy sound.
3. BOTTELING
This is a time where it's very normal for our minds to begin to want to cling to something. A specific thought, a memory,
a daydream, or perhaps even fear of the future. The mind will go in many directions and that's okay. Take your breath and your cabbage to guide you back to the moment.
Now take a clean empty jar. Put the cabbage into the jar, tamp it down firmly. Then cover it entirely with the juice. Fold the leaves you spared in the beginning and lay them on top of the cabbage. Maybe put something top of the leaves, like a stone, to weight it down. Everything should be covered in and enclosed by the juice. Close the jar just lightly, so air can still get out.
Simply remember to use your breath whenever you feel yourself drifting away from this present moment. Use your breath to come back to yourself to this moment. Right here right now, wherever you are – take a deep breath in and a long and soft exhale out. in this moment it's okay to realize that you may be feeling uncertainty, stress or anxiety in your life. but remember it is simply a reaction to the circumstances around you.
Now let's continue our journey to the next step: Fermenting.
4. FERMENTING
Leave the jar at room temperature for a week. During the fermentation the rising juice may leak a little. If the first bubbles rise, the fermentation process has begun. Your sauerkraut is ready when no more bubbles rise. You can taste your kraut from time to time during the fermenting.
We may not be able to control what life brings our way at this time. What we do have control over is how we react to the challenges or any situations that are brought forward to us. So breathe in and in this moment choose to let all that negative
energy go. release it out of you, into the cabbage. The fermentation will convert this negative energy and make probiotics out of it. choose to find peace and enjoy the simplicity of this very moment. Simply being here with yourself, with us. Giving yourself permission to feel. to be. to let go. breathe in and exhale out.
We may not be able to control the future, but we will now go to the next step and imagine one. The next step will be the last step, the labeling and an exercise for speculation.
5. LABELING
Once the sauerkraut is fermented, it can be stored for a long time. Store it somewhere cold and dark, like the fridge.
Now speculate a due date for a future, where the sauerkraut will be eaten, sometimes big moments warrant simple flavors. Write it on the label, or in case you dont have one – directly on the jar or on a paper which you then stick on the jar.
Speculate on a future moment, in which your sauerkraut will be eaten. Write the due date of this imagined future on the label, like “Good before this event” or “To be eaten before this happens…” An example could be: “To be eaten on the day, when there is no article about the pandemic in a national printed newspaper anymore.” Or “To be eaten by the first transgender president of the United States.” Breath in and breath out. Let your imagination roam in the future.
What possible future are you preparing your sauerkraut for? What time, by whom, where, what society, what situation?
You can speculate about futures in all im/possible terms: plausible or implausablie, preferable or unpreferable, probable or unprobable – the due date can be realistic or even fantastic.
As you begin to take your deep breaths I want you to see and visualize a possible future around you. let it come to you. let the vision enter your cabbage and your body with each breath. welcome the possible future moment, where the sauerkraut will be eaten. what time could it be? what time would you like it to be? let the speculation flow through your mind into every fiber and cell of the cabbage. inhale and exhale. and create a beautiful intention to let go of all the possible futures, just noting down one particular on the label. inhale and exhale all the weight off your shoulders.
In the cellar of my grandparents house we recently found cupboards full of sauerkraut, pickeled vegetables and apricots jam. My grandmother probably cooked them years before she died and they are most likely still edible.
Whether out of generational experience of food scarcity, as a prepper preparing for apocalypses, as a prevention against vitamin deficiency at sea or as a hamster buyer bracing against solidarity: conserving food is historically a method of planning for the future. In this way also kraut was fermented – especially in middle and eastern europe but also in other regions of the world – to sustain mouths in form of sauerkraut at a later time. If preserved with care, sauerkraut can last for months or even years. The process of fermenting itself already takes 1-2 weeks. This makes sauerkraut essentially a speculation on a future time in which and how it is to be eaten.
It's time to release your possible future now slowly.
Let’s begin to bring awareness to your breath again. Feeling any energy within your body. Feel your heart, beating. Connect to that rhythm within you in this moment. Let's take this opportunity to send our gratitude for all that we have right now for your body for your strength and for the opportunity to be able for connection. Let’s send our love and our wishes for strength and love for each other. Whatever energy or force that leads you upon this path in life, may you be healthy, may you find peace within, and may you be guided by love.
Thank you so much for spending this moment with us and making sauerkraut together today. We send you love and all our good energy for you to be strong, be healthy, be powerful and for the future, where we can eat our sauerkraut together. Namaste.
We will now finish by a round of holding your labels in to the camera and making a screenshot. if you want to you can say something about it. Then name the person sharing their label with us afterwards.
Thank you.
