Let it be an International Cuisine Day today and not just Wednesday, ok? Do you agree? In case you agree (and it's not like you have much choice) I will tell you about preserves, the jars with some tasty stuff inside. Amazingly, countries can differ in so many ways, sometimes it's even mindblowing. You live in your country a lifetime, do things a certain way, do your shopping a certain way, celebrate Christmas and Easter a certain way, cook things a certain way. And then one day - BOOM! You come to a different country and understand that you understand nothing! I don't mean language-wise, but rather everyday-life-wise. Even such simple things as shopping (easy as long as you have money) can turn into a quest before you will get used to a different type of goods and even the layout of the stores. For some time you will be occupied by learning all those things and when you finally do it, you will start looking for goods that you used to buy back at home. It's great if you are lucky to find some of the substitutes. However, a lot of things you still will be missing. I'm pretty serious about it, I mean if you moved to a different country for an extended time as a kid it's not such a big thing, because kids adapt much faster than adults. But if you did it as an adult, it gets more complicated, because, unfortunately, nobody figured out how to fight homesickness completely and your eating habits are a pretty big part of it. I can't say for everyone 100% but it did occur to me. The other day I understood that the department with canned food and preserves I don't see jars with pickled tomatoes! There are all kinds of cucumbers, relishes, peppers, olives, garlic, onions and some other things I've never tried or even heard of, but not a single jar of TOMATOES!!!! By the way, have you ever had pickled tomatoes??? Well, in Ukraine we say that if you can't buy something, you can make it. That's my approach in life almost in all cases unless it requires much time and resources. So I bought two boxes of Campari tomatoes, you know those small ones, but not the smallest ones, found a quick recipe for pickling and did it. Here's my result:
Hopefully, the taste will be just the way I like it. I plan to check them this weekend so fingers crossed.
So what else do Ukrainians pickle or marinade? And what's the difference between pickling and marinading?
Firstly about the difference. In Ukraine when we pickle it means that we put some vegetable into extremely salty water or add a lot of salt and keep the vegetable like that for a long time. For example, I bet you do know the sour kraut. So sour krout is made with the help of salt that you add to shredded cabbage and keep that cabbage in a jar for some time till juice starts to appear. With other veggies that usually are not shredded, we use very salty cooked water. For instance, this way we make pickled cucumbers. They differ taste-wise from the cucumbers you usually buy for sandwiches. They are crunchier and saltier and never sweet. The perfect match for a pickled cucumber is mashed or fried potatoes. Jars with pickled veggies are usually sealed for winter in a special way that involves boiling water processing of the jars with their contents. Marinading presupposes adding vinegar to the pickle-water. We usually marinade veggies and mushrooms that we plan to eat very soon. If we want to eat them later on in winter then they also have to go through boiling water processing and have a special air-tight lid. You can believe it or not but every Ukrainian knows all this technique and gets those skills on genetic level ))) The thing is that food shortage during soviet times made us thrifty and every summer we would get ready for the winter making jars and jars of different preserves. So what else do we pickle or marinade? We pickle cauliflower, cucumbers, tomatoes, bell peppers, green tomatoes, aubergines, eggplants, mushrooms, and the craziest of us pickle watermelons. Don't ask me what's the taste of pickled watermelon is, there is no way to make me try it. It's simply sick. But some people like it.
Of course, according to all the doctors in the world eating a lot of pickled food is not good because of the high contents of sodium. But I can tell you that once in a while a crunchy cucumber will not kill you. And if you had a chance to try my mom's marinaded Romanian pepper you would dream about it for the rest of your life!
With all the above said and written I will leave you to ponder about the menu for your dinner!
Bon appetite! Eat healthily and behave!
Sincerely yours!
Hopefully, the taste will be just the way I like it. I plan to check them this weekend so fingers crossed.
So what else do Ukrainians pickle or marinade? And what's the difference between pickling and marinading?
Firstly about the difference. In Ukraine when we pickle it means that we put some vegetable into extremely salty water or add a lot of salt and keep the vegetable like that for a long time. For example, I bet you do know the sour kraut. So sour krout is made with the help of salt that you add to shredded cabbage and keep that cabbage in a jar for some time till juice starts to appear. With other veggies that usually are not shredded, we use very salty cooked water. For instance, this way we make pickled cucumbers. They differ taste-wise from the cucumbers you usually buy for sandwiches. They are crunchier and saltier and never sweet. The perfect match for a pickled cucumber is mashed or fried potatoes. Jars with pickled veggies are usually sealed for winter in a special way that involves boiling water processing of the jars with their contents. Marinading presupposes adding vinegar to the pickle-water. We usually marinade veggies and mushrooms that we plan to eat very soon. If we want to eat them later on in winter then they also have to go through boiling water processing and have a special air-tight lid. You can believe it or not but every Ukrainian knows all this technique and gets those skills on genetic level ))) The thing is that food shortage during soviet times made us thrifty and every summer we would get ready for the winter making jars and jars of different preserves. So what else do we pickle or marinade? We pickle cauliflower, cucumbers, tomatoes, bell peppers, green tomatoes, aubergines, eggplants, mushrooms, and the craziest of us pickle watermelons. Don't ask me what's the taste of pickled watermelon is, there is no way to make me try it. It's simply sick. But some people like it.
Of course, according to all the doctors in the world eating a lot of pickled food is not good because of the high contents of sodium. But I can tell you that once in a while a crunchy cucumber will not kill you. And if you had a chance to try my mom's marinaded Romanian pepper you would dream about it for the rest of your life!
With all the above said and written I will leave you to ponder about the menu for your dinner!
Bon appetite! Eat healthily and behave!
Sincerely yours!
The shelves with preserves in Ukrainian supermarkets. Photos taken from the Internet.
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