In a Pickle

    All across the nation there's a preservation movement afoot.  And it has to do with the time honored process of preserving food.  Before commercial refrigeration it was almost impossible to keep  food fresh for very long before it would spoil.  But almost since the beginning of time, humans have creatively preserved perishable food stuffs by a variety of methods:  smoking, curing, pickling and fermenting.  And once again these methods are being employed by individuals for personal consumption as well as distribution in the market place.

     Recently I reported on a Philadelphia based business, Food & Ferments, and just a couple of weeks ago I came across a similar retail store in Baltimore, Hex Ferments, in Belvedere Square.

     The pickling process isn't a difficult one.  According to David Joachim and Andrew Schloss, authors of The Science of Good Food, it "begins when vegetables are submerged in a salt brine--basically a mixture of salt and water."  They say that any fresh vegetable can be pickled, with the most common ones being cucumbers, peppers, and okra.  The brine's salinity level depends on what is being pickled and the anticipated end result.  For example, cabbage is fermented into sauerkraut at 1% to 2% salinity for about a month.  For cucumbers it is more like 5% to 6% salinity for half that time to produce a good sour pickle.  The popular Jewish deli pickles are brined at 3.5%.

     We can thank the beneficial bacteria lactobacillus for enabling the brining process to take place.  It is during pickling that the bacteria grows and at the same time suppresses the other more harmful bacteria that promote spoilage.  That is because the good guys are the first to metabolize the sugar in the vegetable, leaving none for the bad guys to find.  The lactic acid that forms actually preserves the vegetable and increases the amount of B vitamins and also contributes to the vegetable's aroma and tartness.

     And the good news is that you can do it all in your own kitchen.  It's easy to do, inexpensive, and healthy!