How to Pickle Anything Like a Pro

How to Pickle Anything Like a Pro

Have you ever tried making your own pickles at home? I’ve not yet, but apparently it’s quite easy. I make jam every year (pumpkin jam around Halloween), occasionally I make chutneys and sometimes even cheese so I should really try pickling too.

You can use ingredients that you’ve grown and picked yourself or things from the supermarket and come up with entirely new flavours of your own.

The infographic below will provide you with handy tips and tricks to make pickling easy and ensure pickling perfection.

Always follow the recipe exactly as altering quantities can risk the spread of spoilage-causing bacteria. It is also important to clean all cooking utensils and jars in hot soapy water.

Some ingredients are better suited for pickling than others and if you don’t have access to garden-fresh vegetables, make sure the produce you choose is blemish-free and crisp. If you want to pickle cucumber, remember to use pickling cucumbers which are different from the regular salad cucumbers that we usually buy.

For the brine, choose pickling salt over standard table salt as the iodine in regular salt will darken the pickles and the anti-caking agents that it contains can make the brine cloudy.

Cider or malt vinegar can also darken vegetables that are light in colour and to avoid this you can use regular white vinegar with less than 5% acidity or if you like your pickles sour, you can use 7%.

Once you have all your ingredients you can start pickling! It’s best to use stainless steel bowls, pots and utensils and always avoid using anything with copper, iron, zinc or brass as they might react with the acidic vinegar.

Check out this infographic and learn how to pickle anything like a pro.

Infographic Source: Fix.com