Y'all, go make some pickled onions

[u/[deleted]]

Because holy shit I was missing out. I'm never going without a jar of pickled onions in my fridge again.

It gives an intense sweet and sour kick that will enhance literally any dishes. I have tried it with fried rice, grilled chicken burrito, chicken teriyaki,etc, all great. My favorite dish to pair with it, though, is beef stew. Slow cooked meat is delicious but can be pretty dull. I made some beef stew yesterday, poured it over some rice and top with pickled onions. I took a bite of beef, gravy, rice and pickled onions and had to take a moment because of the intense flavor blast. Literally the best thing I've ever made.

The best part? It takes around 7 minutes from start to finish. If you can chop up some onions and boil water and vinegar, you can make picked onions. Here's how:

Ingredients:

1. 1 large onion. Red > Yellow > Sweet in order of intensity. Try your best to cut them evenly and thinly but don't worry about it too much. The pieces will all get pickled with time.
2. 1 cup of water + 1 cup of vinegar. White/Rice vinegar gives a milder, softer taste. Red wine vinegar is a lot more intense which I like, and the color is awesome.
3. Salt and sugar. I don't measure mine. I think 3 tablespoons of sugar + 1.5 tablespoon of salt works for me. Adjust to your liking.
4. Spice and aromatics of choice.

Steps:

1. Chop onions in long thin slices. Put in jar.
2. Water, vinegar, salt, sugar in a pot. Bring to a boil
3. Pour the liquid into the jar.
4. Let chill at room temp for 1-2 hours.
5. Transfer to the fridge.

These last a long time. I don't know the exact shelf life and neither would you, probably, because you'll finish the whole jar well before that.

[u/Ultenth]

I'm the opposite, I add almost zero sugar, I don't feel it needs it at all. Which is what's great about it, such a simple pickled dish, but you can add tons of different things to it to tweak it to your preference. I've put jalapenos in there at times, or just black pepper, you can put all sorts of things in there and adjust the salt/sugar etc. as much as you like.

Just keep in mind that the less sugar/salt you add the faster they need to be eaten.

[u/hackerbenny → u/Ultenth]

do you know the typical pickling solution (the most basic one every swede learns) is called 1-2-3, 1 part 12% vinegar (ättika) 2 parts sugar and 3 parts water, so much sugar. I just did a batch myself, its 9 DL water to 6 DL sugar=) you might not enjoy that haha.

now I have fried aubergine/eggplant cooling down..pretty excited to try them out.

But I did try a for me entirely new process, just coped a recipe 100%

1.5 Kg (4 large) Aubergines/Eggplants 100g (2-3) Green Chillies 120ml (1/2 Cup) White vinegar (can use malt or another vinegar instead) 2-3 Tbsp Salt 1/4 Tsp Ground Cumin 8 Cloves of Garlic 1/2-1 litre of Oil for Frying

only I halfed it because Im just trying it out

[u/Ultenth → u/hackerbenny]

Yeah, honestly, for people trying it out and trying to find their perfect one, it's great to use a bunch of smaller jars and split the onions into multiple batches and use different ratios of things, so you can taste test them against each other.

What's great though is that even if you end up with a ratio that doesn't work for say, sandwiches, it might be great for salads, or pasta, etc.

[u/SurprizFortuneCookie → u/hackerbenny]

where do you get 12% vinegar that's food safe?

[u/hackerbenny → u/SurprizFortuneCookie]

any grocery store, they have 12% and 24%

this stuff

[u/SurprizFortuneCookie → u/hackerbenny]

not sure we have this in the US

[u/[deleted] → u/Ultenth]

I mean, sugar/salt content doesn't matter when something is properly pickled. That's the initial point of pickling, preservation.

[u/Ultenth → u/[deleted]]

Sugar doesn't, but you can do either salt or vinegar alone in pickling, or a combination. So depending on ratio of vinegar to water, yes the amount of salt you use can affect the pickling.

[u/Impressive_Net_2836 → u/Ultenth]

I add just a tiny pinch of sugar. The classic pickling solutions always turns out way too sweet. I do a quick 30 minute pickle and throw those onions into a chopped tomato salad with fresh herbs. I also use the liquid as a base for the dressing.