Pickled Jerusalem Artichokes
I have a love-hate relationship with sunchokes: I love their taste and crunch, but hate the explosive gas I get from them if I eat too many. So I don’t eat too many. One fantastic solution is to make this sweet and spicy pickle recipe. You don’t end up eating huge amounts of sunchokes — also known as Jerusalem artichokes — and I have never been striken with gas after eating these.
The key here is to use small pieces, like 1/2 inch or smaller. If you try to pickle them larger the middle of them will be soft and icky, not crunchy.
Makes 3 quarts
- 2-3 pounds sunchokes (choose small ones if possible)
- Juice of 2-3 lemons
- 4 cups water
- 1/3 cup kosher or pickling salt
- 3 tablespoons turmeric
- 4 cups cider vinegar
- 1 cup white wine vinegar
- 1 cup water
- 1-2 cups sugar (depending on how sweet you want them)
- 2 tablespoons mustard seed
- 1 teaspoon dry mustard
- 1 tablespoon chile flakes or 1 dried chile per quart
- 1 clove per quart
- 1 bay leaf per quart
- Cut sunchokes into 1/2 inch pieces and put any cut pieces into a bowl of water with the lemon juice in it — they will discolor otherwise.
- When you have them all cut, mix the 4 cups water, 1 tablespoon of the turmeric and the 1/3 cup salt. This is your brine. Brine the sunchokes for a day.
- To make the pickling liquid, mix the vinegar, sugar, 1 cup water, the rest of the turneric, mustard seed, dry mustard, chiles, cloves and bay leaves (basically everything else) and bring to a boil. Stir well and let it cool to room temperature.
- Get your hot water bath ready if you plan to can these. Skip this if you plan on keeping the pickles in the fridge.
- Fish out a chile, clove and bay leaf and put one in each jar.
- Rinse the sunchokes well, then pack into jars. Cover with the cooled vinegar mixture. Make sure to leave at least 1/4 inch of headspace if you are canning.
- Process in a hot water bath for 10-15 minutes.
- Wait at least a week before eating.
