In a Pickle at Christmas

House Doctor Food Factory Jars filled with Italian Pickles in Oil

One of the things I love about modern life is that we get inspiration from all over the globe, but at Christmas this equates to having your cake, everyone else's cake and eating it all after a huge turkey dinner. As if Christmas cake, pudding, yule log, trifle and mincepies aren't enough, we then make sure we have panetonne, stollen and fortune cookies in the house. Lovely .... but there are limits.

So this year I have been making some changes and concentrating on the savoury bits. After all, everyone in my family professes to prefer the Boxing Day cold cuts to any other part of Christmas feast. The gravalax, the turkey and stuffing sandwich (with hamisha gherkins, cranberry and mayonnaise or it just isn't the real deal), the Christmas ham...

So to keep the multiculturalism alive and well, I decided to resurrect a recipe an Italian chef of ours used to make to accompany cold platter lunches in one of the restaurants we had when I was growing up. In my book, far better than a pickled onion, she used to make pickled vegetables by blanching them in hot wine vinegar and then keeping them covered in olive oil with herbs and garlic. As long as you keep them below the oil, they keep for a good long time, but frankly I am not expecting ours to last much longer than boxing day. They are good made a week in advance but a few days will do so you still have time!

Ingredients

Orla Kiely Extras for the Ultimate Allotment Chic

1 litre white wine vinegar
1 litre water
2 tablespoons sea salt
500ml extra virgin olive oil - perhaps a little more to cover your veg
5 or 6 cloves of garlic finely sliced
Sprigs of woody herbs such as thyme, sage, rosemary and / or bay for flavour
1kg vegetables

The vegetables can be whatever you fancy - the Italians do this with all sorts of veg from char grilled aubergines to peppers or wild mushrooms. I've gone with a mix of courgettes, red peppers for Christmas colour, fennel bulb because I love it, romesco Cauliflower because I though little florets would look like mini Christmas trees and carrots. Shallots might be good too.

Prepare your vegetables in bite size pieces and have some sterilized jars (put them through the dishwasher on a hot wash if you can) to hand. Alternatively if they are for your own use and you are planning to eat them all up soon, you can do them in and covered container and keep them in the fridge. Place the olive oil, herbs and garlic in a mixing bowl. You can add chilli too if you fancy.

Bring the water, vinegar and salt to the boil on the hob. Add your vegetables and simmer for 3 minutes. Then strain with a slotted spoon or through a colander, shaking off the excess vinegar. Mix into the bowl with the oil and herbs whilst hot and they will absorb some of the oil and flavour immediately. Finally, jar the up, making sure all the vegetables are kept below the oil and tapping the sides of the jar to release any trapped air.It is the fact that the oil keeps the vegetables away from the air which really preserves them, so put a little less in the jar and a little more oil if needs be. Seal and label the jars. Keep in a cool, dark place for a week or up to three months.

If you keep the vinegar / water mix you can top it up to make a couple more batches but you can't keep it for ever. The olive oil, however, ends up flavoured with all the herbs so is great for dressings after you have eaten the veg.

Addendum

I have given some of these jars as gifts to hosts who have invited us over the Christmas party season. I also like potting up some pansies and cyclamen in a simple pot as a small gift as it adds some nice autumn colour to the garden. I was going to write another post about this, but the life of a retailer at Christmas can be hectic, so here is a quick picture instead! Have a great Christmas!

Food Obsession?

Not that I am obsessed with food, but this quick lunch seemed worth taking a picture of. It is one of those days when you go to the fridge looking for some inspiration and find it waiting for you - last night's left over potatoes, some garlic butter I made for a barbecue the other night but made too much, some mizuna leaves from the garden and a few marinated anchovies. I simply sautéed the potatoes up with some of the garlic butter, salted them at the last minute and popped it all in a plate. A blob of mayonnaise later and lunch was ready to go. 

Enjoying a nice lunch also seems to be about serving it on a nice plate and taking time away from the computer. It is so easy to work through next to the laptop, but I'm sure if you make your lunch break a treat, you get more work done in the afternoon. 

Making Pesto...

I love keeping pesto made in the fridge at this time of year. Our local green grocers does large bunches of basil at a really good price at this time of the year. I make a big bunch of it up into pesto and then use it on tomatoes (which I like to keep out of the fridge so they are really tasty), fresh pasta with sautéed courgettes or with just to dress up shop bought hummus and lunchtime sandwiches.

If I have time I get the pestle and mortar out to make it as bruising the basil leaves in that gives it more flavour, but if not I simply chuck the basil in the blender with a couple of cloves of garlic and chop it find, then add about the same weight of grated Parmesan and toasted pine nuts, together with a good slug of olive oil. Blend again but leave a bit of texture, then jar it up with a layer of olive oil on top to preserve it.

Photo credits

Mango wood chair and chopping board by House Doctor. The chairs we only ordered for fig1 HQ but we can order them in. Copper lidded jars by House Doctor as well - we love the copper and mango wood combination - pretty much my inspiration for the fig1 kitchen at the moment. The bowl the tomatoes are in is a favourite from Rice - I keep going on about the retro two tone colour combination of these jars, but I've hidden the inside in these picture a little!