Wild flavored pickles

In this recipe, we made truly fermented pickles using wild aromatics. Most pickles, you can buy in shops, are not fermented but pickled using vinegar, which has its place, but gives a different flavor profile. In Eastern Europe, fermented pickles are strongly preferred and used as an ingredient, for example, in pickle soup (see serving suggestions).

Typical aromatics added to pickles when fermenting are mustard seeds, horse radish, garlic, dill, and kale leaves. We found mustard (Sinapis arvensis) seeds in the wild. The other ingredients we substituted with garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata) root, wild garlic (Allium ursinum) bulbs, hogweed (Heracleum sphondylium) shoots, and hedge mustard (Sisymbrium officinale) respectively.

The fermentation process is simple. You only have to put fresh pickling cucumbers and aromatics in a jar, submerge them in water, and add 2% – 3% of the total weight in salt. Then, leave the pickles in the sealed jar (with some type of airlock) for a week or two (depending on the temperature), or when the flavor is to your liking.

Print Recipe

Wild flavored pickles

Prep Time15 minutes mins

Fermentation time14 days d

Course: Condiment

Cuisine: Slavic

Keyword: fermenting

Equipment

• 1 Fermentation jar
• 1 Electronic scale

Ingredients

• 600 gram pickle cucumbers
• 1 hogweed shoot
• 10 wild garlic bulbs
• 30 gram wild mustard seeds
• 4 garlic mustard roots
• 1 hand full of hedge mustard leaves
• 18 gram salt

Instructions

• Wash all ingredients and sanitize the fermentation jar. Put the fermentation jar on an electronic scale and press the tare button.
  
• Add the aromatics to the fermentation jar.
  
• Add the pickles vertically next to each other. Add enough water to submerge the ingredients.
  
• Multiply the weight you now see on the scale by 0.02. This is the amount of salt in grams you should add which should be around 18 grams.
• Put the closed jar in place out of direct sunlight and let it ferment for about two weeks. The temperature is of big influence on the fermentation speed. The warmer it is the faster the fermentation will go. Be sure to use a fermentation jar with some type of air lock. If you would use a completely sealed jar the jar could explode.
  

Notes

Fermented pickles can be used as a base for a soup. Typically, pickled soup includes boullion, potatoes, onions or garlic, and carrots, and it is seasoned with bay leaves and allspice, and topped with cream and fresh dill. Our version included smoked tofu, which matches pickles very well.