Mr. Sauerkraut Aims For No. 1

Looking for that Christmas gift for someone who has everything?

Head to Broadway and University in the Spokane Valley.

When you see the 4-foot signs, you’ll know you’ve either found what you are looking for or have entered the Twilight Zone.

“Mr. Sauerkraut,” blare black letters against a white background, “12 fresh flavors.”

Knock on the door of this clapboard home on the southwest corner. Mr. Sauerkraut just might take you down to his jar-cluttered basement lair.

The Kraut Room.

It is here that Weston Withers - Mr. Sauerkraut’s given name - transforms cabbage heads into the pungent side dish treasured especially by Germans and eastern Europeans. It’s a five- to seven-week process, which usually ends during the Christmas season.

When finished, Withers sells his kraut at $4 a jar, unabashedly proclaiming it the planet’s finest.

“I have a reputation,” declares Mr. Sauerkraut. Withers, 70, is a character. Five-foot-6 and stocky as a pickle barrel, his bullet head is topped with retreating wispy hair.

His eyebrows, which could pass for a couple of miniature ferrets, make up for anything lacking on his dome.

Withers once made good use of these striking physical attributes by growing a bushy beard and cavorting about as a leprechaun on St. Patrick’s Day.

Visitors should be advised that Mr. Sauerkraut is one of those opinionated fellows who supposedly has done just about everything and isn’t shy about telling you.

According to Withers, he has fished commercially, driven a logging truck, fixed up houses, sold cars, worked in oil fields, repaired jet engines, trained animals for Walt Disney and wrassled a pet bear. Who knows?

“He’s got to be a novelty of the Spokane Valley,” says Dave Kinyon, a farmer and friend of Withers. “He does make good kraut.”

Ah, yes, the sauerkraut.

It is in this strange realm that Withers has earned a shred of local fame.

His wife, Margarette, prefers it that way. Whatever you do, don’t call her Mrs. Sauerkraut.

“I’m Mrs. Withers,” she says a bit testily. “I have no part of that.”

Withers learned the cabbage arts from his Ukrainian grandparents, who migrated to the Spokane Valley a century ago. Over the years, he began experimenting with flavors.

The result is a menu that includes such kraut variations as caraway, celery, garlic, dill, dill-garlic, mustard, jalapeno, habanero …

Those contemplating a visit to the Kraut Room should be warned. This is not a place for the finicky.

An insect-riddled fly strip dangles from the ceiling, almost directly over one of the liquid-filled kraut tubs. Cottony cobwebs obscure a window.

Withers enjoys treating his customers with sips of kraut juice from a plastic cup that he uses over and over.

He thinks nothing of plunging a bare hand into a five-gallon kraut tub, fishing out a morsel for a guest. “Taste this,” he says, extending his dripping fingers.

Friend Kinyon suspects this loose sense of hygiene may affect sales. “I don’t know if he has a lot of repeat customers,” he says. Once he takes you to the Kraut Room, “it’s just about a done deal.”

Mr. Sauerkraut has a hankerin’ for doing things the old-fashioned way.

He grates the cabbage on a 75-year-old oak cutting board. This year, Withers says he bought 400 pounds of cabbage, which will make 270 quarts of kraut.

Once the cabbage is in a bucket, Withers hammers it with the fury of a loan shark going after a debtor. Then comes salt, water and secret spices.

The cabbage is eventually covered with a dinner plate that is weighted down with large stones Withers says he pulled from the Spokane River.

It is just a matter of time before the air fills with the unmistakable, breathtaking stench of fermenting cabbage.

Stench? Not to Mr. Sauerkraut.

“My niece came down here and said, `How can anything that smells so bad taste so good,”’ he says. “Sauerkraut isn’t really stinky. It’s aromatic.”