Pickling and pickles appreciation thread

[Eschaton]

Pickles are interesting to me because they started out as a way to preserve shit (ie people preferred fresh veggies) but ended up being something completely different and amazing on their own

gonna give some love to Claussen, the best 'pickle' pickle




I also love korean banchan, many of which are various pickles made of preserved vegetables and other shit. And of course kimchi




I also of course love indian aachar, which has a spicy, sour, salty taste that adds the perfect accent to any curry dish





Fuck the haters, you all suck

[Shaka Khan]

Pickling

One of my favorites is Makdous



Basically they're pickled stuffed baby eggplants. Stuffing includes: walnuts, red pepper, garlic, olive oil and salt. It's so angelic, friend.

[Madrun Badrun]

Nothing like a nice pickled head looking back at you on your desk.

[Eel O'Brian]

laugh all you want, but pickled eggs are some good stuff

[Mr. Gundam]

I sent somebody a jar of my wife's spicy pickes a few years ago for Secret Santa. Can't remember who, but the pickles are amaaaazing.

[Dickie Dee]

Weird time to see this thread pop up. I literally just made my first pickled anything over the weekend. Mediteranean/Middle-east pickled turnips. Dead simple to make too. The Shaka-level of intense pink comes from a slice of beet in each jar, surprised me when I found out that's all it was.


(That's not my image, mine are still in the zygote stage).



....

Now I just have to play the waiting game 

[Mr. Gundam]

I had tempura pickled ginger in Osaka last week. That was pretty damn amazing.

[huckleberry]

Weird time to see this thread pop up. I literally just made my first pickled anything over the weekend. Mediteranean/Middle-east pickled turnips. Dead simple to make too. The Shaka-level of intense pink comes from a slice of beet in each jar, surprised me when I found out that's all it was.

(Image removed from quote.)
(That's not my image, mine are still in the zygote stage).

working next to a Lebanese place for years spoiled me on those.

[Rufus]

The ultimate fermented food, Kiviak.

Kiviak is a traditional wintertime Inuit food from Greenland that is made of auks preserved in the hollowed-out body of a seal.

Around 500 auks are put into the seal skin intact, including beaks, feet and feathers, before as much air as possible is removed from the seal skin, which is then sewn up and sealed with grease, with a large rock placed on top to keep the air content low.[1] Over the course of seven months, the birds ferment,[1] and are then eaten during the Greenlandic winter, particularly on birthdays and weddings.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kiviak

[Shaka Khan]

Fwiw, Indian Aachar, which I'm assuming is the stuff made with mango, is so very very demonic. We add it almost to all our spiced rice dishes.

[Rufus]

Sorry about that, but I have to inflict this knowledge on people. I've learned about it from Moyashimon, an anime about microbes (and a guy who can see them as easily marketable, smiling little dudes).

[fistfulofmetal]

Kosher yuck

[fistfulofmetal]

Bread and butter

[Mr. Gundam]

I had tempura pickled ginger in Osaka last week. That was pretty damn amazing.

Please tell me you have a picture of this. Was the sharpness of the ginger still intact? Howd they serve it,  whole?

I just checked my phone. No picture. It was a huge piece of pickled ginger. If you've ever had it on top of yakisoba or something, it was like that, but breaded and crispy.

edit: Google image searched pulled up this.


I thought it was a sweet potato or something before biting into it.

[etiolate]

banchan

One Christmas a friend of the family made us all pickled asparagus, green beans and cucumbers. noms

[nachobro]

Bread and butter

disgusting

[Phoenix Dark]

The funny thing about pickles is a nice fresh one makes a sandwich taste great, but I often have this weird bias where I automatically decline pickles. Maybe it's a habit of not putting anything extra on sandwiches.

fresh pickle on a Reuben

[Shadow Mod]

Korean pickled appetizers

 

[tiesto]

Banchan is my favorite part of eating Korean food...

[Shadow Mod]

kalbi 

[chronovore]

Japan has a really wide range of pickles. Of course the ginger which comes with sushi is pretty awesome, and Esch already mentioned the pickled plums, and there are so many crazy variations.

The one most common around my area is mizunasu, a stunt, pear-shaped eggplant which has been buried in rice lees for a day or two. This permeates the skin, ferments the eggplant, but the meat deep inside is still raw, so it has a number of textural and taste changes in a single bite.

One I don't like is called shiokara, which are baby squid which are caught and immediately thrown into salt and sealed up. These... well, Japanese say "ferment," I say "rot" for a while, and the sludgy black stuff is eaten with rice or as a side-dish with any alcohol.

[chronovore]

Oooh, ah -- I forgot, growing up, we always had a jar of pickled pigs' feet in the fridge. Mmmm. Bone jelly.

[a slime appears]

This thread is fucking glorious.

dill pickles

picked eggs

kimchi

tsukemono

I'm gonna try my best and hunt down all the other recommendations in this thread. The Indian dishes look amazing.

 

[CatsCatsCats]

Stuff is yummy

[CatsCatsCats]

Also pickled herring is pretty legit, my wife's family is Swedish

[Huff]

big fan of the pickled small white onions

[a slime appears]

Aachar is readily available at any indian or international market. I personally recommend Mitchells

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

HOLY SHIT, PICKED GARLIC!?



Esch, you are truly a king among men. Finding a jar of Mitchell's is my new goal in life.

[chronovore]

Ooh, right. Japan also does pickled garlic -- it's purple, and I think they're using shiso leaves and whatever they use for shibazuke. I love them, but it appears most makers are using garlic from China to produce their pickles, so I've had to give them up.

[doctavius bonbon]

Weird time to see this thread pop up. I literally just made my first pickled anything over the weekend.

I've been experimenting with it lately. I like to do quick rice wine vinegar pickles before work to come back and eat for side dishes when i make something asianesque, and when i finish a jar of the big claussens I use the leftover brine to tenderize meat. Currently got some pork sitting in pickle juice right now.

I actually hear that the key to amazing fried chicken is to have the chicken sit in a heavy brine/pickle juice for a while. See:

Making this tomorrow B)

[Kara]

sauerkraut 

[Rufus]

Finally someone mentions it.

[recursivelyenumerable]

I hate regular dill pickles, they are completely inedible to me. I do like some other pickled stuff like kimchi and pickled garlic though. I guess pickled + spicy can = good while pickled + not spicy = disgusting.

[chronovore]

Patty Shack in Redwood City served fried pickles; these were full-length pickle wedges which had been breaded and deep fried, served with blue cheese dressing. They were not something I'd enjoy every day, but were pretty great on the days we indulged.

[recursivelyenumerable]

Blue cheese is inedible too. I know it's supposed to be all sophisticated to like it and stuff but bleach

Yes I am all salty in this thread

[chronovore]

Anyone else here use the phrase, "Full of piss and vinegar"?