Getting in a right pickle with pickles
I always enjoy the start of the year when different food writers and critics make their predictions for the year to come.
There were some weird ones out there this year (get ready for fried crickets), boring ones (millet is the new quinoa apparently), and some ‘about time’ ones (ice cream sandwiches finally make it here).
The one commonly agreed prediction though, was the continuation of foraging, and seasonal cooking, even greater use of local produce and all types of preserving food. Fermenting is tipped to be very popular.
And I smiled because we are almost describing as trendy what our grandparents would have considered commonplace. And their grandparents. Preserving food is as old as mankind itself, ancient man freezing seal meat in the ice of the northern latitudes and drying fruit in the sunshine of the tropics.
No matter how vigorously we rub it with garlic or how much Himalayan salt we use, the process remains the same. The only thing that has changed is that it now fits into the current renaissance of food thinking alongside sourdough bread, farmers markets and micro breweries. All to be encouraged strongly, no matter how hipster or quasi-political it may seem.
I developed an interest in food preserving (to my eternal shame) not from a glut of heirloom tomatoes in my allotment but from a glut of cheap vegetables rotating on a weekly basis in my local supermarkets.
Cucumbers for 39c each or vine tomatoes for 99c a kilo mean you can have a larder full of wonderful chutneys, relishes and pickles for a fraction of the cost of the shop bought ones.
You will have rows of brightly coloured jars of yellow piccalilli, deep red tomato sauce, and large pots of pickled carrots. Earthenware pots of pungent kimchi will sit beside daikon pickles. And you will be king of the hipsters.
Basic pickling is very simple and will allow you to experiment with a vast amount of creations. Pickling is done by removing some of the water from the fruit or vegetable and replacing the water with vinegar. You cube or slice your vegetables and cover them with salt for a few hours. This extracts a fair amount of water. You then wash off the salt and immerse everything in vinegar and like a squeezed sponge the vegetables will reabsorb the acid. This prevents the food spoiling for months, if not years.
Some food you don’t even need to salt first, so here is really easy sweet pickled cucumber that will liven up sandwiches and salads for months:
Mix well and put in a big jar of 3 jam jars. The whole lot costs about €1.50.
I’m not going to give too many recipes here because we all know Google is your friend for this but here is another recipe that works so well and tastes so different. This is for pickled carrots with caraway seeds and again this should cost less than €1 to produce. If you can get a mix of different coloured carrots the pickle looks very unusual, otherwise just stick with your traditional ones.
Ingredients:
1. Place the carrots and caraway seeds in a bowl or jar.
2. In a large bowl, combine vinegars and sugar. Bring the water to a boil, remove from the heat and add to the vinegar and sugar mixture.
Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Add the salt and stir well.
Pour over the carrots and caraway, cover and refrigerate for at least 2 days before eating and for up to 2 weeks.
The longer the better really as the caraway really starts to work. Shake the jar from time to time.
These will be good for a couple of weeks. Serve with a slotted spoon.
Another popular vegetable in the heavily discounted, or two for the price of one department, is the aubergine — a vegetable that if cooked badly can be quite grim but addictive when done well.
This is an unusual recipe and not for the faint of heart, but it is quite simple and the results are quite striking.
Take enough small aubergines (about the size of your fist) to fit whichever jar you intend to use (about 120g each). I have a large octagonal jar that fits five or six. Add them to a saucepan containing a boiling mix of 100ml vinegar and 100ml water. Put the lid on and simmer for 5-10mins until the aubergines are just soft, but not mushy.
When they are ready, squeeze them gently to remove the water, slice them down the middle and stuff them with a mixture of five chopped garlic cloves, 1tbsp dried mint and ¼tsp salt.
Next carefully slide the aubergines into the jar you have picked — which will pack them in tightly. Cover them with 125ml fresh cider vinegar and 1tbsp of water (15ml). Secure the jars and leave them in a cool dark place for a month or more.
After opening, slice horizontally into discs and serve. Keep in the fridge once the jar has been opened. It will keep unopened for many months.
When you are Googling for more recipes here try searches for Jewish pickles, Korean pickles or Indian pickles. Try Kimchi or Chow-Chow or an Indian Lime pickle, try apple and chilli chutney.
Tomatoes are another fruit that vary hugely in price (and quality) but regularly provide you with some great of opportunities for larder cooking. Relish recipes are a dime a dozen, passata is great, pizza sauces are simple and tomato and chilli jam is a winner.
A good tip is to halve them, sprinkle with sugar, salt and pepper, add some garlic and rosemary, and roast them in a hot oven for about 20 minutes. They should be starting to burn and the sugar will be caramelising. Let them cool and put five or six of them each in lots of little bags and freeze them. Add them to pasta sauces or casseroles or soups straight from the freezer.
One of my few ‘never again’ recipes was making tomato ketchup because after hours of making it you will always, always be met with: ‘it was nearly as good as the real thing’.
Instead, when you do get a glut of good tomatoes here is a great fiery recipe for Mexican Salsa. If you want to go mad you can add another couple of chillies.
Ingredients
Method
While you dice the onions, simmer tomatoes in a large pot of boiling water until tomatoes start to soften. Peel and discard any skins that have loosened but you don’t need to be too fussy. Toss tomatoes, hot peppers and coriander into a blender. Blend until smooth.
Heat one teaspoon of oil over medium-high heat. Sauté onions and garlic in hot oil for about 10 seconds; just a flash in the pan.
Add blended tomato mixture to the pan with the onions and garlic and give it a stir.
Season with salt and ground pepper to taste. Add cumin if desired.
Simmer on medium-low for about 15 minutes, or until salsa has reduced and thickened. You may need to increase cook time if tomatoes are very juicy.
You can add the juice of a fresh lime or lemon at this point, although it’s not necessary and will temper the salsa’s spiciness.
This should make about 5 good-sized jam jars.
There is something immensely satisfying about preserving food, lining the jars up like trophies in your pantry. It’s a hunter-gatherer feeling, a secure feeling of a full larder.
And of course in a few weeks time you will get another immeasurable pleasure of turning a chicken sandwich into a sublime lunch with a jar of piccalilli or serving heaped ramekins of spicy plum chutney with a breast of roast duck.
And all the time knowing that you are so out of date that you are back in fashion.
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
