In a pickle

I was talking to my Spanish friend the other day and we were talking about nuts; I happened to mention that here in England we pickle walnuts – or maybe people don’t any more, but certainly as a child we always had pickled walnuts at Christmas time.

This baffled her and I tried to explain… I told her about pickled onions, and eggs which she had actually seen in a supermarket, and then she mentioned gherkins… but I wasn’t sure if they had pickled gherkins in Spain or if she had just seen them here.

I know there are cold parts of Spain, but not like we have winter in England where traditionally you had to be able to preserve what you grew to last you over the months when not much would grow. Salting, curing, smoking maybe, especially with fish and ham… and then pickling; using the fruits and vegetables from times of bounty to make something which was delicious in its own right and would last through the lean months, and beyond. I love pickling, making chutneys, jams and preserves, I have many books with recipes for using all sorts of vegetables and garden and hedgerow fruits. There is nothing nicer than going out brambling and coming home with a basket of blackberries to make into jam, or elderberries to make into wine, or hips and haws to make into syrups.

We couldn’t preserve things in olive oil or dry them in the sun… but how do olives and sun-dried tomatoes compare to piccalilli and pickled walnuts? (LOL, as my daughter would say!)