We love pickling vegetables for our salad’s as it adds so much flavour and keeps so well. This weekend we had a load of carrots left over from a bag we bought so thought we would try them pickled, as the fennel and cauliflower were so successful. I can never believe how simple and cheap it is, in high end restaurants you often have pickled baby veg on the menu, I think this jar cost around 50p to make and is such a good way to use up leftover veg. You can use the same brine liquid for any vegetables or you can do a mixed jar. Once you start there is no going back I wish I had tried pickling vegetables sooner.
Ingredients – (made 1 jar)
- 8 carrots
- 2 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
- 1-inch piece of fresh ginger, cut into slices
- 6 whole black peppercorns
- 1/2 tsp whole mustard seeds
- 1/2 tsp whole coriander seeds
- 2–3 fresh sprigs thyme
- 150ml white wine vinegar
- 50ml water
- 1 tbsp honey
- 1 tsp salt
Method
- Peel the carrots, slice off the stem ends, and trim them so that they will fit into a your preserving jar with half an inch of head space above them. Cut them lengthwise into quarters.
- Put a piece of the garlic, ginger, pepper, mustard and coriander seeds into a sterilised jar. Hold the jar at an angle making it easier to fill with the carrot batons, once you have layered around half a dozen of baton’s insert a piece of ginger, garlic and spice mixture repeating until jar is tightly full so it will infuse the whole jar
- Tuck in the thyme can use a baton to push it down between the layers
- Put the vinegar, water, salt, and honey into a small pot and bring them to a boil over high heat, stirring to dissolve the salt and honey.
- Pour the hot vinegar brine over the carrots and other ingredients in the jar. Be sure that the food is completely immersed in the brine, but there is still 1/4 inch of head space.
- Wipe the rim of the jar clean. Screw on the jar lid tightly (we use a rubber glove). Store in the refrigerator for up to 3 months wait at least four days for the flavour’s to develop before tasting.
Inspiration from Leda Meredith
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