Guest Blogger: My daughters research paper.

Pickles

In the mood for a pickle juice snow cone? How about a pickle candy cane during the holiday season? Or even some pickle flavored chewing gum or mints? Well, this tangy, salty, sweet, and savory snack is so beloved by us, that we have made a ton of unbelievably wonderful, flavorful, and sensational kinds and variations of it that tickle our taste buds. Pickles have been in some of the most important events of history, including Shakespearian plays, biblical texts, and many important historical figures’ lives (including Amerigo Vespucci, Christopher Columbus, and Napoléon Bonaparte). Pickles are often considered the work of five star chef and artisans, but not anymore! Read on to find out how to safely make and preserve pickles in five different ways.

When making fermented pickles it is important to know about lactic acid and salt. The first thing you need to know about is lactic acid. When produce is actively fermenting, salt turns natural sugars into lactic acid. Lactic acid gives fermented pickles their characteristic tang that everybody loves. The second thing that you need to know about is salt. Salt is very important during fermentation. If there is too much salt, the sugars will be overpowered and lactic acid won’t have a chance to be created. However, if there is too little salt, the sugar will overpower it. That will make too much lactic acid, making the pickles disgustingly sour. Also, it is important to make sure that you use salt specifically labeled for pickle making. Regular salt usually has iodine, that will darken your pickles. In addition, it has anti-clumping agents that will cloud your brine. Therefore, lactic acid and salt are very important when making fermented pickles.

There are some precautions that you should take in order to successfully make your fermented pickles. One of them is to keep your pickles under the brine. Oxygen will spoil your pickles, so if you keep them under the brine, no excess oxygen will touch them. Another one is to keep your pickles at the correct temperature. The ideal fermenting temperature is between 65°F - 85°F. This is important because if the temperature is too high, the pickles will ferment too fast, making them too sour to eat. If they are too cold, they will not ferment at all. Finally, you should check on your pickles daily, just in case anything has gone wrong (i.e. they are floating above the brine). In conclusion, before fermenting produce, you should know some tips for making delicious fermented pickles.

When making quick pickles, fruit pickles, relishes, and chutneys you need to know the similarities and difference between them. For example, the similarities and differences between fruit pickles and quick pickles is that fruit pickles are a type of quick pickle. They both use vinegar of at least 5% acidity instead of lactic acid. They do not undergo the long fermentation process, hence the name ‘quick’ pickle. However, fruit pickles generally are topped with a boiling vinegar sugar mixture, giving them a much sweeter taste then regular quick pickles. Another example is that a chutney is a type of relish. To make relish, you chop produce into small pieces and cook them down in vinegar. You do this with chutneys as well, but they have more complex flavors. Relishes are usually a one note vinegary/salty condiment, in contrast, chutneys are tangier, spicier, sweeter, and more savory then relishes. Therefore, quick pickles, fruit pickles, relishes, and chutneys are all a type of quick pickle, but are very different from one another in taste.

Once you have made your pickles, you need to know how to preserve them. When preserving pickles, you need to know the difference between pressure canning and a hot water bath. Pressure canners are good for preserving low acid foods, like beans, and non-pickled vegetables. On the other hand, preserving using a hot water bath is a great technique for preserving high acid foods, like fruit, pickles, and vinegar based sauces (i.e. tomato sauce). You should always preserve your pickles with a hot water bath, unless the recipe specifically says otherwise. You also need to know the steps to preserving food in a hot water bath. The first thing you do is place your filled pickle jars in a pot filled with hot tap water with a rack on the bottom. Then, you turn on the heat and start the timer when your water starts to boil. The heat from the boiling water makes the jars expand a very little bit , pushing out all the air. Additionally, the heat kills harmful bacteria. Finally, after about 10 minutes, you can lift your jars out of the boiling water with jar lifters. As the jars cool, they retighten, creating a vacuum seal that will keep your pickles fresh for at least a year. As you can see, these are the steps to preserving pickles using a hot water bath.

There are a lot of great tips and tricks to ensure that your pickles are made safely. For instance, you need to know when your pickles have spoiled. When pickles are slimy, smell bad, have a cloudy brine, or are pink they have spoiled. If your pickles are extra bitter, they are not spoiled, and are perfectly safe to eat. Although, if you want your pickles to be less bitter, don’t dilute the vinegar!! This will throw off your recipe’s exact ratio! You can add more sugar or other sweeteners (i.e. honey) to solve the problem. Also, unless your pickles are actively fermenting, you should also throw them away if any mold is growing on your them. However, if your pickles are actively fermenting, any mold you see forming on the brine, it can be removed with a spoon. Therefore, you pickles will be safe to eat if they have the right qualities.

Also, you need to know how to safely preserve pickles. To do this, you need to thoroughly sanitize your jars. When sanitizing your jars, you need to scrub them inside and out, and then boil them for 10 minutes to kill any bacteria and germs. Also, you need to make sure your jars don’t break. There are three reasons a jar could break: thermal shock, pressure, and impact. Thermal shock is when jars break because of dramatic changes in temperature. This will happen if you put cold jars in boiling water, or if there is no rack on the bottom of your pot, and the jars are right on top of the flame. When jars break because of pressure, it’s usually because there wasn’t enough head space in the jars, or the screw bands were screwed on too tightly. This makes it so that no air can escape the jar when it is boiling. Impact will break a jar is if it is swung around, thrown into something, dropped, or otherwise damaged. Therefore, there are many steps to safely preserve pickles.

I hope I have renewed your undying love for the humble yet complex flavor of pickles by teaching you to preserve and safely make pickles in five different ways. Now that you know how to ferment, brine, and preserve anything from cucumbers to lemons, apples to beets, and even shrimp, what’s stopping you! Grab some mason jars and a couple of ingredients, and get pickling!

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That is the paper.but it also included a shopping trip to the Brooklyn Brine Co.  When you are in 7th grade and let the owner of a pickle factory know you are doing research on pickles you get a tour.