Marvin Miller of Lehighton is an expert at making homemade sauerkraut and has been making it for the past 10 years.

“This year we made over 1,200 pounds of sauerkraut. We had over 600 bags and only have 60 left,” he said.

It isn’t that he makes the sauerkraut for his own love of the shredded cabbage in brine.

Although he does like it, Miller and the other local Shriners, who help harvest and make the homemade sauerkraut, sell it to raise money to donate to Shriners Hospital, where doctors and nurses help to make miracles possible for kids facing severe medical challenges.

“This year sales were way over what we expected. We had a church in Slatington buy over 50 pounds of homemade sauerkraut for their New Year’s dinner, and we had a fire company buy 200 pounds,” he said.

All the cabbage is bought from a local farm in Andreas and they wait for fall to harvest the cabbages because according Miller, fall cabbage is the best tasting cabbage.

“Once people taste homemade sauerkraut they don’t want anything but homemade,” Miller said.

The Shriners

Shriners International is a fraternity based on fun, fellowship and the Masonic principles of brotherly love, relief and truth. With nearly 200 local chapters and thousands of clubs on six continents, Shriners are known for their fellowship, brotherhood, compassion and generosity. The fraternity established Shriners Hospitals for Children as its official philanthropy in 1922, and continues to support it today, while striving to make the world a happier, better place.

There have seven temples in Pennsylvania.