Pickled gherkins

A recipe from cooking-ez.com

For 500 g, you will need:

• 1 500 g fresh gherkins
• 2 300 g coarse salt
• 3 1 sprig tarragon
• 4 pepper
• 5 300 ml white (spirit) vinegar
• Total weight: 1,100 grams

Times:

Preparation	Resting	Start to finish
40 min.	4 hours	4 hours 40 min.

Step by step recipe

• 1: Wash the 500 g fresh gherkins thoroughly.
• 2: Brush each gherkin under running water to remove all the little "bristles" and give it a smooth surface.
• 3: If you don't have a suitable brush, or if you prefer, you can use my grandmother Jeanne's method: rub them with the corner of a tea-towel.
• 4: Cut off any remaining stalks from the gherkins.
• 5: Rinse again, then dry with a tea-towel.
• 6: Put the gherkins in a bowl with 300 g coarse salt for 3 hours to draw off some of the juice.
  Note: contarary to popular belief, there is no need to soak them any longer than this, as they will start to dry out.
• 7: After this time, discard the salty water and rinse the gherkins...
• 8: ...and soak them for 1 hour in a bowl of cold water. We do this so that the gherkins will not be too salty.
  After one hour, drain the gherkins and dry them on a tea-towel.
• 9: Pour 1 sprig tarragon and a few peppercorns into the bottom of the jar you are going to use.
• 10: Fill the jar with gherkins and cover with cold white vinegar (there's no need to boil or even heat it).
  Seal the lid and leave to mature for a month before eating.

Remarks

You can use a different vinegar if you prefer, but if you do not use white vinegar, your gherkins may take on an unusual colour.

---