Pickles & Things

The Mr. and I recently joined a CSA. CSA stands for community supported agriculture.... And that is awesome. Once a week we wake up to a box on our doorstep filled with organic fruits and veggies of all kinds. Its pretty wonderful and forces us to learn how to cook using obscure new ingredients. plus, it's pretty much like getting mail in the morning...and we all know how much I love getting mail. Anywho, you will hear more about this in some upcoming posts (stay tuned) but for now we need to discuss something.

Food waste.

Look, I'm not proud, but sometimes this produce picker gets a little ahead of herself at the market and we end up with enough fruits and veggies to feed a family of six..... for a week. And then it happens. That awful day once a week where I clean out of refrigerator and find all of the things that are now past their "best by" date and moving into the trash can. So this week, with our first CSA delivery looking for room in the fridge, I decided it was a good idea to jump on that good old pickling bandwagon once again.

Now, I don't necessarily pickle the good old fashioned way. I am more a fan of refrigerator pickles.... You know, the kind that give you almost immediate satisfaction. No canning equipment, no waiting, no bullshit. And the best thing about pickling this was is that it is pretty much fool proof. You need some vinegar, some spices, some things to pickle (in my case.... all of the veggies that are about to expire) and voila. Pickles.

Basic ingredients:
1 cup of vinegar (white or cider work great, sometimes I do a combo of two..... usually I just use white)
1 cup of water
1 tablespoon of salt

And whatever of the following tickles your fancy:
Garlic
Sliced jalapeño
Sliced onions
Dill (mmmm dill.....lots and lots,  please)
Spices and herbs (mustard seeds, dill seed, coriander seed, fennel seed, peppercorns..... Go crazy!)


Method:
Slice, dice, and chop your veggies that you want to pickle to your hearts desire and arrange them in a glass mason jar with a few cloves of garlic, about 1/4 of an onion (sliced) and some sprigs of fresh dill. Have some respect for yourself and make it look nice!

In a saucepan combine the vinegar, water, salt, and spices. I usually do 1 tablespoon of yellow mustard seeds, 1 teaspoon dill seeds, 1 teaspoon celery seeds, and 1 teaspoon of coriander seeds. Bring the mixture to a boil and then remove it from the heat and pour it into the glass jar with your veggies. Cover the jar with the lid, let it cool, and put it in the fridge. That's it! Now, because these are refrigerator pickles, they must stay refrigerated! Unless you get into all of that fancy canning stuff, you cannot store these pickles at room temperature. They will, however, keep perfectly in your fridge for 2 weeks..... If they last that long!

Pickled Green Beans

We have picked about 300 green beans in the last two weeks.
Well, that is before Rich killed our green bean plant (he will be in a cranky mood in 5...4...3...2.... he takes murdering our plants extremely seriously.)
I take eating our plants seriously, but even I cannot eat 70 pounds of green beans.

So.... what the hell does one incredibly smart and attractive girl do with three bushels of green beans?

trendy.

Well, that (pretty and brilliant) girl jumps on this odd trend of pickling. 

Pickling is trendy?

......I guess so. 

I mean, when mason jars and canning pots have their own display at every snooty home and kitchen store, I am going to go out on a whim and say that I just may be jumping on the bandwagon with this whole thing. 

I am not a trailblazer. 

It just so happens that you can pickle just about anything..... and the majority of those things will taste really good in a bloody mary which is right up my ally. 

Ingredients:

1/2 pound of green beans, trimmed (BS. I clearly did not weigh our harvest.... so stuff as many as will fit into a quart sized Mason Ball Jar)

1 cup white vinegar

1 cup water

1/4 onion, thinly sliced

4 garlic cloves, smashed

1/2 jalapeno, sliced

2 tsp yellow mustard seeds

1 tbsp white granulated sugar

1 bay leaf

1 tbsp salt

3-5 sprigs of fresh dill (fresh dill is so yummy.... you can sub for dried, but you shouldn't)

Method:

These are refrigerator pickles. You do not need to sanitize the jar. You don't need to boil it. You don't need any equipment. 

Begin by filling the mason jar with green beans, sliced onions, jalapenos, garlic, and dill. Make it look nice for God's sake..... nobody wants to eat/ look at ugly food.

In a small saucepan, bring the vinegar, water, sugar, and spices to a boil. 

Pour the hot mixture into the mason jar leaving about 1/2 an inch at the top. If there is still room at the top just add a little vinegar and water. Screw the lid on, set aside to cool and then refrigerate. The beans should be ready in a day or two and will last for a month in the fridge..... if you can muster up the will power to not devour them all in 3 days.