Giardiniera
If I could be a condiment, I would be Giardiniera (literally ‘gardener’ in Italian). It is a delicious relish of pickled vegetables in vinegar and there are slight variations of it out there, along with some hard-core die-hard fans for certain ways of making it. Typically, it is made with fairly specific selection of fresh and crunchy garden vegetables. A lot of the time, giardiniera is used on sandwiches, and in that case, the vegetables are chopped pretty small. There isn’t so much a precise recipe for this, per se, so I’ll just explain my method here. But feel free to do some research out there on the interwebs to get a more precise ratio for vegetables, if you’d like more specific instruction.
You typically see cauliflower, carrots, onions, fennel, celery, and peppers (both sweet and spicy) in giardiniera. Aromatics, like garlic, oregano, and bay leaves are also important. You chop all your vegetables in your desired sizes and toss them well in a bowl. You then stuff them in clean sterilized jars, and cover them with a pickling brine. For this batch pictured, I chopped one small head of cauliflower, four carrots, three small red onions, a pint of small shishito peppers, one jalapeno, 1 fennel bulb, three stalks of celery, 4 garlic cloves, 2 teaspoons of dried oregano, and 3 bay leaves.
The brine is a standard pickling brine, and for a half gallon jar of pickled chopped vegetables, I heat 4 cups of vinegar (I like half white vinegar and half apple cider vinegar), 4 cups of water, and two tablespoons of salt in a pot on the stove until it comes to a boil. I then pour the hot brine over the chopped vegetables in the sterilized jar and fill it so the vegetables are completely submerged. I cover it and leave it out on the counter until it cools. Once it’s cooled, I store the jar in the refrigerator. I suggest using a plastic jar lid, but you can also put a piece of parchment paper under a metal jar lid to stop the acid in the vinegar from corroding the metal lid.
Some people choose to can the giardiniera so it is shelf stable at room temperature, but I just refrigerate mine and eat it up within a few weeks (though it can last a few months under refrigeration). I like eating giardiniera on prosciutto and provolone sandwiches, with eggs, or just as a side condiment to any food or meat we’re eating. And a large jar typically doesn’t last long in our house because it’s just so delicious.