Category: Pickles + Preserves
Pickles + Preserves Recipes
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This was a big hit during the Fourth of July. Some people asked me how the okras remained crunchy even after being pickled for two weeks. My secret is skipping the blanching part of most pickling recipes. After washing the okras thoroughly, I pat them dry with paper towels and put them in a jar.…
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I picked up a copy of Fuchsia Dunlop’s Land of Plenty from the library last week. I skimmed through it before I checked it out because I wanted to see if the recipes were easy to do at home. I’m obsessed with this dry-fried string beans dish I always order when I’m eating at Grand…
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I couldn’t ignore the beautiful photograph that accompanied Amanda Hesser’s recreation of a 1948 tomato preserve recipe in The New York Times Magazine last month. I cut the recipe short and marinated the tomatoes in sugar for only a few hours instead of overnight. I didn’t seed the tomatoes either, nor did I remove the…
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Watermelon rind pickles are apparently a Southern thing. But I first had them at Fatty Crab, a Zak Pelaccio restaurant here in New York City devoted to Southeast Asian cuisine. I’ve been wanting to recreate their dish served with crispy pork belly at home, and the opportunity finally came when Cameron and I started planning…
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In a week’s time, New York City has gone from spring to summer. Temperature was up 76 last week and I wore shorts to work. Good thing the produce at the farmers’ market was still in spring mode because I couldn’t have celebrated the warm weather without having my first ramps of the season. I…
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It really can’t get more decadent than this: one of my favorite sausages happily marinating in the finest olive oil and fresh herbs. Well, okay, add foie gras and you’re really set. But this is so easy; requires only a week of preserving and you have yourself about two weeks’ worth of appetizers. Ingredients: a…
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I’ve changed the name of this dish from Jean-Georges’ original recipe, Cucumber Marinated with Orange Peel, because I only used the orange zest to sprinkle on the dish before serving. What I kept was the marinating juice, Chinese-style. This was a great appetizer to another Jean-Georges recipe using fish. Ingredients: 1 cucumber, peeled, cut into…
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My mother doesn’t like the smell of cloves nor anise. When I use them, she never fails to tell me that they remind her of the dentist office. I’m not exactly sure what smell she’s referring to, but to me, the combination of cloves, anise and cinnamon, smell like the forest after a good amount…
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I can always count on Cameron to introduce me to something simple, yet presentable, in the kitchen. I’ve had figs before, of course, but their taste never jumped off my plate. At least until she served a mixed salad with them one night when I came over for dinner. It was a bright appetizer that…
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I’m going to be away for two weeks, so I thought I’d pickle again so that it’s ready when I return. At Fairway, they had some fresh Israeli cucumbers for sale. They were small enough to fit an old pickling jar I kept, so I picked up nine pieces with some dill and mustard seeds.…
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What to do with eight pounds of cherries? After our trip to Dutchess County, I wanted to use some of the cherries we picked from Barton Orchard in some kind of sauce. There’s no avoiding using cherry preserve in this recipe–it helped make the fresh cherries a little more sweet than tart. The allspice and…
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A month ago, my neighborhood supermarket had a lemon sale. I bought a wholeload but didn’t really know what to do with a lot of them except to preserve them for a future chicken tagine dish. I was already pickling like a maniac, so why not? Ingredients: 4 whole lemons juice of 4 other lemons…