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Learn how to Pickle Vegetables the easy way | Toursi



Toursi | Pickled Vegetables
In Greece people often pickle vegetables as a way of preserving all the bounty from their gardens. These days I’ll buy the vegetables at the store but I still make it a lot so we always have it on hand. The exact amount this recipe makes always depends a little bit on the volume of vegetables we use. It’s worth having an extra small jar available in case you have extra!
4 quarts (we use 4 1-quart jars)
3 celery stalks
4 large carrots, peeled
3 cups mini red and yellow sweet peppers
1 whole medium size cauliflower
3 cups button mushrooms
8 pearl onions (2 per jar)
½ bunch of parsley, coarsely chopped
8 whole garlic cloves (2 per jar)
3 TBSP kosher Salt
1 TBSP granulated sugar
1 ½ cups white Vinegar
1 TBSP peppercorns
Clean the vegetables and prepare them as follows:
Cut the celery on an angle into ½-inch thick pieces
Cut the carrots into rounds that are 1-inch thick
Remove the stem from the sweet peppers
Peel and trim the tops and bottoms of the onions
Cut the cauliflower into florets
Bring a large pot of water to a boil and blanch the prepared vegetables, one type of vegetable at a time, leaving the mushrooms for last. Each vegetable should be slightly tender once it is blanched. This allows it to absorb the pickling juice better.
To blanch them: add the vegetables to the boiling water and allow them to boil 3-5 minutes, remove them from the water and allow them to drain. Be sure to blanch the mushrooms last because they will make the blanching water a little dirty.
Once all the vegetables have been blanched and dried, add them to a large bowl together. Then add the chopped parsley to the bowl of vegetables.
In saucepan on the stovetop add 5 cups of water, 1 ½ cup white vinegar, the salt and sugar and warm the mixture over medium heat to dissolve the sugar.
Fill jars with even amounts of the vegetables, including two onions per jar and two cloves of garlic per jar.
Pour enough of the water mixture into each jar to fill it to the very top.
Screw the lids onto the top of each jar and turn the jar upside down to make sure there is enough liquid in each jar. Add more liquid as needed.
Store the jars in your pantry upside down until you open them. Once they’ve been opened store in them in the refrigerator.

26 Comments

  18. Jacqui Cherry

    You just killed all of the good bacteria from your vegetables when you blanched them. I wouldn’t be surprised if (or at least a lot of folks did this years ago) the pickles your grandparents made were made not with vinegar, but with a brine mixture. That allowed them to ferment, and become natural pickles. Once opened, they definitely go in the fridge, unless you have a very low-temp basement or something like that. If you seal those jars after you’ve opened them, they’ll continue to ferment, pressure will build, and it will potentially burst the jar! You’d have to refrigerate them to prevent that from happening. They’re sooo delicious ! And they’re so good for you! Probiotics galore!

    Besides being delicious, they could (can) also be used for multiple illnesses, as well as improving general health. Sipping on the juice can ease GI upset from viruses, etc.

    Fair warning: if you decide to give them a try, start off with just a small amount at a time, and build up. They’re so good at killing bad bacteria that they can upset your stomach (trying to get the dead bad bacteria out of the body).

  22. Dale Peter Deden

    Some good grocers are willing to order “horse carrots” for you. It’s a good way to get big ones. Sometimes the grocer will allow you to buy a portion of their order. Others may ask that you buy the case/pack. They’re usually really inexpensive purchased this way.

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