Thursday, September 29, 2011

Book: The Joy of Pickling

photo:  Amazon.com. 

I like pickles.

I like making pickles.  I like eating them.   I like looking at them.

This year I was braver and tried a bunch of new pickles.  Then I found this book and tried even more.

These are not your grandma's pickles.

But....wait a minute.....some of them ARE your grandma's pickles.    This is a great collection of new and traditional pickles from all over the world.

I've made three kinds of lemon pickles, ginger pickles, sauerkraut, etc, etc, etc.    It's a pickle jackpot.

The book is divided into two main parts:  pickling with fermentation and pickling with vinegar.

Fermentation pickling happens when you let natural bacteria make your pickles for you.   The old pickle barrels were fermentation vats.   Sauerkraut is made by natural fermentation.  It's fun and easy and delicious and very very good for you.    Try it.

Vinegar pickling is what happens when you pour a vinegar solution over the veggies and let them sit in it.   The vinegar solution usually has salt and other spices in it to make things interesting.   This type of pickling is also very easy and delicious.

Lest you think that this is 250 recipes for dill and sweet cucumber pickles, let me assure you that there are recipes to pickle all kinds of fruit [yes, fruit!] and veggies in all kinds of ways, with all kinds of flavors.  

If you're at all interested in making pickles, get your hands on this book and read it.   Even if you don't go near the stove or touch a veggie, you'll still learn a lot about a type of food that has been around for milennia.  


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