Pickle, Preserve & Ferment

For the pickling assignment I chose to do two different raw food products; green beans and mushrooms. We had some green beans lying around in the fridge and so I chose to pickle them after looking at a couple different websites and recipes, and the pickled mushrooms are an old family recipe.

Pickled Green Beans

2 1/2 pounds fresh green beans

2 1/2 cups distilled white vinegar

2 cups water

1/4 cup salt

1 clove garlic, peeled

1 bunch fresh dill weed

3/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Sterilize 6 (1/2 pint) jars with rings and lids and keep hot.

Trim green beans to 1/4 inch shorter than your jars.

In a large saucepan, stir together the vinegar, water and salt. Add garlic and bring to a rolling boil over high heat. 

In each jar, place 1 sprig of dill and 1/8 teaspoon of red pepper flakes. Pack green beans into the jars so they are standing on their ends. Ladle the boiling brine into the jars, filling to within 1/4 inch of the tops. Discard garlic. Seal jars with lids and rings. Place in a hot water bath so they are covered by 1 inch of water. Simmer but do not boil for 10 minutes to process. Cool to room temperature. Test jars for a good seal by pressing on the center of the lid. It should not move. Refrigerate any jars that do not seal properly. Let pickles ferment for 2 to 3 weeks 

Pickled Mushrooms
2 1/2 cups white vinegar

1 3/4 cups water

3 tbsp salt

1/3 cup chopped onions

2 1/2 teaspoons whole black peppercorns

5-10 chopped garlic cloves or more if you really really like garlic

pinch of tarragon

Wash and drain mushrooms. In a large pot, combine vinegar, water and salt. Heat to dissolve salt. Add mushrooms and bring to a boil. 

Once boiling, reduce to simmer, stir occasionally. While simmering, add to each jar (sterilized) 1 tbsp onion, 1/2 tsp peppercorns, as much garlic as you want, and a pinch of tarragon, or green dried things. Simmer 10-12 minutes, or until tender. Careful not to overcook, or they turn into rubber. 

Pack into jars: leave about an inch of space to the top. If you have more mushrooms to boil, don't add the brine until you're done packing all the jars. After you've run out of mushrooms, fill the jars with brine to 1/2" below the top of the jar (while still hot). Make sure all air bubbles are removed. Put the lids on, and tighten. Tighten again after the "pop". 

The Pickled mushrooms were very nice. They had a good garlic flavour and were all to easy to just pop into my mouth like popcorn. However the green beans were awfully salty. Unfortunately there were some nice flavours but they were overcrowded by salt. I believe my issue was trying to follow more than one recipe and thus I may have mixed up my measurements thus over-salting the beans. I would like to make them again in the future with one solid recipe because I enjoyed the crunch and spiced flavour in the beans, I was just not able to get over the overwhelming salt.