To Pickle Vegetables
Ingredients
Directions
Brine the vegetables
Choose fresh vegetables and place them in open casks or small tubs.
Cover with brine made from 1 pound of salt per gallon of water.
After 3 days, change the brine and let them sit for 2 weeks.
Prepare and bottle
Wash the vegetables in fresh water and bottle them.
Cut up vegetables like red cabbage and cauliflower as needed.
Fill bottles with weak vinegar or a vinegar-water mix and let stand overnight.
Drain the vinegar and fill bottles with boiled, cooled strong vinegar mixed with spices.
Add chillies and peppercorns to the bottles if desired.
Cork the bottles securely and store them on their sides in a dry place.
Let the pickles sit for a few weeks before using.
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.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Coarse sea salt
- Draws water out of the vegetables and forms the brine that preserves them.
- Vinegar
- Adds acidity that keeps the pickles tart and helps preserve them in the bottles.
The step that matters
Covering the vegetables fully in brine. Vegetables that stick out above the brine can spoil or grow mould, because salt only preserves the parts it fully covers. Keeping everything submerged protects the batch during the long salting period.
“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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