Suan cai, pao cai, sauerkraut, and kimchee can all be made without the addition of any starter cultures, but adding a little bit of inoculant gets things going quicker and in some cases produces a more diverse, stable, and productive microbial system.
My past research into Effective Microorganisms (EM) as developed by Dr. Higa for composting have proven to me that this inoculant creates a highly stable and diverse microbial environment which produces a myriad of enzymes, vitamins, antioxidants, antibiotics (which work against pathogens and “bad” bacteria), and other beneficial compounds through fermentation.
I’ve recently come to find out that this can be used for food preservation and can even be consumed directly as a probiotic and a natural vitamin, enzyme, and supplement for other nutrients. The company that makes it, Terganix, assured me that EM1, the original effective microorganism inoculant meant for bokashi, is made by an identical process as their human probiotic product. They are simply not allowed, by law, to sell a product as a plant fertilizer/soil amendment and as a product meant for human consumption at the same time, so they slap a different label on it.
I’ve ordered a bottle of EM1 and will be using it as a starter culture/inoculant.
Another option is using the juices and/or veggies from a friends ferment or a store bought, and trusted, product. I may mix a little of this with EM1 to increase microbial diversity and add microbes already adapted to eating cabbage and other vegetables. A side-by-side comparison of ferments started with one or the other would be interesting as well. This may be a future project though.