Hello,
New to fermenting. Started making my own milk kefir recently out of necessity really since my local grocery store stopped carrying it - really glad I did! Much cheaper and I'm not having to throw plastic quart containers in the recycling bin every few days. Decided to try sauerkraut as I read this is the easiest vegetable ferment to get started with. Not sure but I think I messed it up already. I used 2 heads of cabbage, shredded in my food processor, sprinkled each head with 2 tablespoons of pink Himalayan sea salt, kneaded, crunched with my hands, let sit for about an hour then packed it into 4 separate, wide-mouthed mason jars with a wooden spoon until liquid covered the cabbage. I only filled each jar up half way then took a cabbage leaf and put that on top of the shredded cabbage and tucked it in as best I could, then used the 2 part mason jar lids and screwed them on loosely, set the jars into plastic containers to catch any escaped liquid and put them in a dark room. My house stays at about 76-78 degrees with A/C. Started this on Sunday so today will be 4 days. So far I haven't seen any bubbling and I'm wondering if I should have filled the jar up closer to the top? I've read different amounts of time it takes to become sauerkraut - anywhere from 3 days to 8 weeks?
Any advice would be appreciated!