To Pickle Lemons Without the Peel
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Peel the lemons and slit each one down three times, without dividing them.
Rub fine salt well into the divisions.
Cure
Place the lemons in a pan and keep them there for a week, turning them every other day.
Put the pan in a Dutch oven over a clear fire until the salt has become perfectly dry.
Pack and age
Arrange the lemons in a jar.
Pour sufficient boiling vinegar over them to cover, adding the same ingredients as in the preceding recipe.
Tie the jar tightly closed.
Let the lemons sit for about nine months before use.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures. See the original page.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Lemons
- The fruit being preserved; its rind and flesh soften and mellow during the long curing.
- Salt (in the method)
- Draws moisture out of the lemons and helps preserve them during the week of curing.
- Vinegar (in the method)
- Covers the lemons as the preserving liquid and adds sharp acidity.
The step that matters
Drying the salted lemons until the salt is perfectly dry. Any moisture left in the salt or on the fruit will dilute the vinegar and weaken the preserving effect. Drying the salt before packing keeps the brine strong and the lemons well preserved during the long aging.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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