Grandma Even Had a 100-Year-Old Pickle She Kept Under Lock and Key

October 4, 2023 6:26 AM

“No one makes aged pickles any more. Around 35 years ago, they were common, but now, the lack of time, space and several other factors have led to a decline in their making. Customers who buy my black lemon pickle speak of their childhood memories of it and how its taste transports them back in time,” Rummy said. from India’s pickle people: Decades-old culinary heirlooms, nostalgia

ANCIENT INDIA AND PICKLE
Why India Loves Its Achar: The Origins & History Of Pickles
A Brief History Of The Humble Indian Pickle
Previously

posted by chavenet (9 comments total)

I stock up when I can on Patak's Lime Chutney, which I'm sure is exactly the looked-down-upon indian-pickle methadone that first article describes, and I wish I knew how to to make the real thing to some approximation of comparability. What little of the world's variety of this that I've experienced is just so good.

The whole idea of ten- or fifty- or hundred-year old pickles is incredible.
posted by mhoye at 6:50 AM on October 4, 2023 [6 favorites]

I'm going to again sing the praises of Usha's Pickle Digest, which came up in some previous Mefi posts: “It just adds that sour, spicy, savory element to any meal,” 🥒 and 1000 Ways to Love Rasam. The copy I have is a junky print on demand on flimsy paper, the recipes are somewhat… minimalist, but there's just so much there, an entire universe of pickle adventures.
posted by zamboni at 8:14 AM on October 4, 2023 [11 favorites]

I have childhood memories of my mom getting together with her sister and making, say, a dozen 2 liter jars per household of lemon/lime pickle. There was no sun drying involved, IIRC, just slicing and salt, chili, turmeric, oil. These were not to be touched for at least six months, because that's how long it took to properly cure everything. My mom would speak wistfully of having more time to age it for perhaps a year or even two. But nobody could leave the pickles alone for that long. Even in 1980s at a time when my mother and her sisters were not yet working outside the home, the women had barely enough time to make these things by hand frequently enough to keep up with the demand, let alone make extra for ageing.

What DID involve even more effort and sun drying was papad-making! My mother and her sisters and/or sisters-inlaw would spend the whole day grinding lentils, making them into paste, flattening out the paste in little thin rounds by hand - crouching on their heels for hours on end, making neat rows and columns of discs on huuuuge sheets of plastic (where did they find such big sheets of plastic in the 1980s?? surely not in any normal hardware shop - they must have been from the aeronautical plant my uncle worked in) - and laying the whole thing out on the roof to dry in the sun for a couple of days before packaging all of it up to store in our homes. If the weather report was wrong and it happened to rain, or if there was unexpected wind, the children were dispatched upstairs double quick to roll up the plastic sheeting carefully, with a supervising auntie threatening to smack our bottoms if we were careless enough to break any of the papad.
posted by MiraK at 8:46 AM on October 4, 2023 [13 favorites]

Oooh I just remembered what they used to do, they used to squeeze out the limes and lemons with a juicer!! We used to have *weeks*' worth of lemon cordial after the pickle making, all summer long we would drink lemonade every afternoon.
posted by MiraK at 8:59 AM on October 4, 2023 [6 favorites]

Usha's Pickle Digest is indeed a delight, this NYT article is a nice overview. I love my copy but it is pretty difficult to work from as a non-Desi American. It assumes a level of familiarity and access to ingredients I just don't have. Which makes it interesting all of its own! (My copy is also some terrible print on demand copy, apparently that's how it's been for a long time. If you're really skint you can also find unlicensed PDFs online.)

The article about 30 year old pickles is fascinating, particularly about the preservation techniques when you can't use oil. I can't tell if the extreme age creates a unique flavor or is just desireable for preservation of food and family memory. The heirloom element is fantastic though!
posted by Nelson at 10:02 AM on October 4, 2023 [6 favorites]

Wonderful post, thanks so much!
posted by Bella Donna at 1:09 PM on October 4, 2023 [1 favorite]

One of my favorite cookbooks, Copeland Marks' Indian & Chinese Cooking from the Himalayan Rim goes into depth on pickles and chutneys, with a full chapter of recipes. It was interesting to read that at least around Mumbai and Kolkata, the flavors reflect a historical infusion of Baghdadi Jews.

Nahoum & Sons has been there since 1874 (known for its pickles in addition to its pastry).

Marks notes some particular practices in Indian pickling to deal with the environment: use only fresh, unblemished produce and fresh herbs. Quick pickles are make with a little oil which then seals the surface against spoilage (without refrigeration). Only wooden utensils are used, and it is forbidden to use the mixing spoon to taste test chutney. (Like, more than in other places, apparently.)
posted by snuffleupagus at 3:08 PM on October 4, 2023 [3 favorites]

I've made at least 30 different pickles from Usha's book. It's great.

Here in England I can usually get more or less all but the most obscure Indian ingredients but I've definitely had conversations in Asian food stores in Watford where even the shopkeeper said, "I've heard of that but never seen it for sale".
posted by atrazine at 2:39 AM on October 5, 2023 [3 favorites]

In Kerala there's a strong tradition of non-veg pickles. Beef achar, prawn achar and fish achar are amazing.
posted by Flocculencio at 6:09 PM on October 5, 2023 [5 favorites]