Just like any other day of the year, you, being the growing teenager that you are, climb into your parent's car after school and immedialy declare that you "are hungry". Like usual, your parental unit rolls his or her eyes, accuses you, the teenager, of actually being a black whole, and  then proceeds to tell you that dinnner will be at home tonight. You get home and sit down for dinner, where you are presented with a nice full plate of sauerkraut. Upon smelling your dinner, you proceed to wrinkle your nose at the sheer thought of consumming this...alien substance that has landed on your plate, tricked the cook into believeing that it is something appetizing like spageitti, presented its self as "dinner", and demanded that you, the helpless teenager, devour and or inhale it promptly so that it can infeltrate your body's defenses, override your brain,  and turn you into an utterly thoughtless living zombie, complete with drool and extended arms. After indentifying this "food" for what it truly is, you stare at it and then at your mother as if to say, "Mother...What is this...stuff?". Then you go about thinking what you would never say aloud, "It smells like Middle-of-August sun baked road kill."

           Indeed, young teen, you are right...kind of. Like road kill, sauerkraut undergoes the process of fermentation, which is why your U.F.O. (Unidentified Food Object)smells the way it does. Fermentation is described as "various controlled aerobic or anaerobic processes used for the manufacture of certain products (as alcohols, acids, vitamins of the B comlpex, or antibiotics) by the action usually of yeasts, molds, or bacteria" (Webster's Third New International Dictionay). Unlike road kill, sauerkraut is eddible and, for some, enjoyable. Another thing is that sauerkraut is not an alien substance; in fact, it is a European delicacy. It does directly translate to 'sour cabbage' though.

          So you've been convienced that this cabbage stuff is not actually from another planet, but now you want to know HOW this stuff came to be. Well, grass hopper, one makes sauerkraut by shredding a ton of cabbage heads into a bucket, adding sugar, salt, and the other ingrediants into said bucket, and then one applies constant pressure to a plate or such that is placed between the cabbage and the pressure device. After that, one leaves the cabbage to ferment for days on end. While you are attending your regular business, your sauerkraut is undergoing an intense process in which bacterial acids, formed by glycosis, are eating away at the cabbage slivers. The decomposing of the cabbage is what makes this dish smell the way it does.

          Other things undergo the process of fermentation thanks to Leuconostoc mesenteroides as well. Most people over the age of twenty-one greatly appreciate Leuconostoc mesenteroides because it is responsible for the fermentation of their beer and wine. What goes well with wine? Bread, another product that has help from Leuconostoc mesenteroides, goes well with wine. Some dairy products also contain this helpful little bacteria. Most anyone who enjoys pickled or fermented food appreciates Leuconostoc mesenteroides though. Because these people are thankful for Leuconostoc mesenteroides, they are also thankful for Leuconostoc Van Tieghem, the man who discovered Leuconostoc mesenteroides back in 1878. Leuconostoc mesenteroides is also used to make spandex gel beads to use for labratory or industrial sperators.

         If you are really going to start picking through that heaping plate of sauerkraut to find this bacteria, you should at least know what you are looking for. You will be looking for a either grape shape, coccus/ cocci, bacteria or an elongated rob like shape. Also, look for 'slime'. This bacteria is non-motile, so you don't have  to worry about it moving away from you ('cause you know bacteria could move fast enough and all. Pfft. Yeah right.).

        After listening to someone tell you all this, you notice that your "sauerkraut" has crawled off your plate and back into the kitchen...oh wait, no. The dog ate it...and you wonder why Fido's breath smells so bad.

                                                                                         (Written and edited by Sarah Doonan)