Did you know that Ohio has its very own sauerkraut juice manufacturer?
Did you know that there is apparently a market for sauerkraut juice? Not sauerkraut, but the juice that comes from sauerkraut. Pure juice. Seriously, who knew?
Frank’s Kraut Juice boasts a label that says it’s been around since 1905. It’s distributed by The Fremont Company out of Fremont, OH, an operation that happens to own the URL sauerkraut.com. Fremont is the home of both Frank’s Kraut and Snowfloss Kraut along with a few other goodies such as ketchup and barbecue sauce.
But about the juice. There is an answer to that last question (who knew?). Frank’s Kraut Juice has 48 earnest customer reviews on Amazon, most of them (75 percent) are five-star. People have used the juice to make a Bloody Mary. People use it for soup. People drink it straight. It’s also part of something called the Budwig Protocol in an alternative cancer-treatment.
Even without those reviews, who could resist at least one go-round?
Fully armed with ideas for usage from the internet, opening the juice can is no big deal. The juice comes in a 16oz can, just like regular kraut. Its contents smell like sauerkraut. The liquid is clear, a ringer for apple juice (this could suggest a promising application for tricksters). It tastes . . . exactly like you might expect, sour and salty. Not bad, just . . . not something for which one typically yearns. There is a recipe suggestion on the label that sounds intriguing: it suggests combining the kraut juice with tomato juice and horseradish.
The label also has the nutrient information. The juice is weirdly high in Vitamin C (60 percent of the RDA). It’s got 30 calories per serving, half from carbs (expected), half from protein (not actually expected). The internet says it’s also rich in probiotics, which are still trending for their contributions to the digestion process.