Sweet pickled figs in cardamon, pickled plums in coriander and allspice, pickled mirabelles in vanilla and black cardamon

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This collection of sweet fruit pickles with different spices came about from a conversation with Gloria, she mentioned making pickled plums and how the sweeten spiced vinegar was very good to use in vinaigrettes.  As Gloria put that idea in my mind I could see how lovely it would be to use the pickled plum itself as part of the dressing, whizzing it to a pulp making a fruity creamy dressing to use in a robust starch based salad.

Unusually I was lucky enough to buy mirabelles, not something you see often.

First Batch: pickled figs and greengages in coriander seeds, allspice berries, black peppercorns and lemon peel.

Second Batch: pickled figs and Victoria plums in green cardamon, black peppercorns, lemon peel.

Third Batch: sweet pickled apricots, mirabelles and Victoria plums in vanilla pod, black cardamon and cinnamon.

Gloria Nicol’s Sweet Pickled Plums

This amount of vinegar made 4 x 500ml jars of pickled plums, plus a bit leftover.

Note: I used white pickling vinegar instead of white wine vinegar in Gloria’s recipe because it was much cheaper.

  • plums
  • 1 3/4 cups white wine vinegar
  • 1 3/4 cups white sugar
  •  3/4 cup water
  • 1 1/2 tsp chinese 5 spice
  • lemon peel strips from half – 1 lemon
  • 1 tsp pink peppercorns
  • recycled a vanilla pod previously scraped and used for something else

Prick the plums with a toothpick or skewer and pack them firmly into sterilised jars. Place all the other ingredients in a pan and bring to a simmer, then pour vinegar over the plums till they are completely submerged. You can pour the vinegar through a seive if you like, in which case it might be good to leave the warm vinegar to infuse for an hour or 2 or longer and if you do this then push a piece of vanilla pod, a strip of lemon peel and a few of the peppercorns in with the plums – cos it looks nice too. Seal the jars and leave for a month or 2 to mellow before opening.

 

My Variations
For the first batch I changed Gloria’s spices to:
  • 1 tablespoon of coriander seeds (unroasted)
  • 1/2 tablespoon of black peppercorns
  • 25 allspice berries
  • 1x long strip of lemon peel
For the second batch I changed the spices to:
  • 20 green cardamon pods slightly crushed
  • 1/2 tablespoon black peppercorns
  • 1x long strip of lemon peel
For the third batch:
In this third batch I made it equal amounts by weight of vinegar to sugar unlike in the previous ones where there’s slightly more vinegar to sugar and for that reason I went for more sweet note spices.
  • 400g vinegar
  • 400g sugar
  • 180g/180ml water
  • 1 vanilla pod, opened and seeds scrapped out into the vinegar, then cut into quarters
  • 15 black cardamon pods (not crushed)
  • 2 short cinnamon sticks
Proceeded as above making sure the spices are divided up between the jars.