I love pickles. I love them in burgers, in salads, in sandwiches, alongside meat dishes, with noodles and right out of the jar. But nice pickles aren’t cheap and you can easily make your own with pantry ingredients and fresh vegetables. I like a simple combination of thinly cut carrots and cucumber with sprigs of home grown dill, but you can use this recipe with sliced radish, daikon, beans, fennel and anything else you might like to pickle. When using hard vegetables, these pickles will last up to 1 month before they start losing their crunch. With softer vegetables you want to consume them within 2 weeks.

For one 500ml jar of pickles you will need these things:

Ingredients

3 large carrots (or equivalent)
1 large cucumber
3 big sprigs of dill (you can replace this with fennel seeds, corriander seeds or any other flavour you would like your pickles to have)
Pickling liquid:
1 cup of just boiled water
1/2 cup of vinegar (I used a combination of red wine vinegar and white vinegar)
1/4 cup sugar
3 teaspoons salt

Method

1. Thoroughly clean and dry your vegetables before slicing thinly. With the cucumbers you can cut them more thickly as they pickle within the day.
2. Take a clean and sterilised 500ml jar or two 250ml jars and pack them as full as possible with your vegetables, herbs and spices.
3. In a large mixing jug or bowl, combine the pickling liquid ingredients and stir until the sugar and salt are dissolved.
4. Pour the liquid over the vegetables in the jar ensuring that they are all covered. Secure the lids on the jar and place in the fridge to pickle for at least a day before consuming. If using hard vegetables, wait at least 5 days.