What a Pickle…
I have dabbled with preserves throughout my entire culinary journey.
My tendency to improvise when following recipes has to be reigned in slightly, as some fundamentals need to be adhered to, but I still aim to express an individual touch. An attempt at beetroot chutney was a triumph solely because I felt the addition of star anise was warranted. However, while a chilli jam had ‘great colour and consistency’ it lacked the ‘kick’ of the shop brought version I was keen to replicate. My intuition told me to retain the seeds for their fiery contribution, but they get stuck in the ever increasing cavities of my decaying teeth, so were omitted.
Above all it‘s the sterilizing process that has always proved the main impediment to fully embracing the pantry shelf-filler. I’ve watched countless TV experts, attended a bijou cookery school off Portobello Road and picked the brains, figuratively, of a generation to whom chutneys and jams were second nature. Yet paranoia persisted as to what might happen if, for example, the chilli oil (another so-so result) harboured botulism, as one blogger warned with colourful illustrations.
I had a craving to replicate ‘kebab style’ chillies in a nod to post pub-crawl munchies of yesteryear. It required a week of soaking the long, thin green variety in homemade brine, then a further week in a vinegar solution. The result was pleasant enough and tasted authentic, however the question did arise as to why bother. Frankly, they lacked the occasion, a common denominator in many of my culinary efforts; though I was frugal enough to reuse the liquor for other purposes rather than pour it away.
Much the same quandary might be used to describe my life. I had hoped to blend a rewarding career with a healthy relationship prior to parental responsibilities. It might sound old fashioned, advice lifted from the foreword of Mrs. Beeton’s book of household management, but personal experience weighed heavy on this combination. Yet despite the raw ingredients being seasonally available, I failed habitually to arrive at the desired recipe.
The sour always masked the sweet, the combination of spices either too bland or too strong. As a bitter build-up of unpalatable events accrued any mellow notes were overwhelmed, until finally the container itself became, I fear, contaminated. Hence my larder is empty.
Get P.J.’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
With this final ‘crumb’ the collection nears completion. I set out to preserve some notable events, people and places along my journey. A project steeped in a laptop’s binary for posterity and what a pickle I would have been in if it were not for, in recent years, constant gardening, occasional shed art and habitual writing …
So thank you to the Branston brand, the mango chutneys (I salute you Geeta’s Premium), gherkins various (Mrs Elwood the current preferred supplier), the heavily dyed piccalilli that made childhood cold tongue tolerable, though thankfully avoiding herring rollmops, and to Heinz ketchup my constant culinary companion.
Despite all these preserves, a relish for life was lost along the way.
*****
[Kindly note that this is part of a wider collection titled ‘Just Crumbs’ — Please refer to the ‘foreword’ page for an explanation.]
As a precursor, I invite you to listen to … Me, I disconnect from you — Tubeway Army
Thank you for reading these crumbs… Project concluded.
