Jarmageddon

Is it a drawer of shame or opportunity? Plus pickled cauliflower, perfect cheese and how to keep your crackers crisp.

Dear readers, I need to unburden myself about something. Behold my secret shame:

This is a drawer in my kitchen that’s home to cake tins, lunchboxes, Thermoses (Thermi?), empty yoghurt containers and glass jars. Many, many glass jars. At least once a week I feel the red mist of rage when trying to shut it. About once every couple of months, I very performatively de-clutter it, matching containers and lids and stacking things in as orderly a fashion as I can manage. Anything that doesn’t have a properly fitting lid gets recycled, ditto anything with an irritatingly persistent label (Maille mustard is particularly bad for this!) But I swear they multiply while I’m not looking.

Two very beautiful jars that may not make the cut: one is missing the lid, the other has a persistent sticky label residue that no amount of housewifely voodoo has been able to remove (yet).

My husband calls it a jar cemetery, but I actually think he doesn’t realise how lucky he is. About 99 per cent of these jars are on their second or third (or fourth or fifth) life. It could be much worse; I could be one of those people that buys matching virgin storage ware and a labeliser. Who knows, maybe I secretly want to be one of those people and my jar hoarding is just the latent expression of it.

In the meantime, I prefer to this drawer of shame as one of potential and opportunity. All these jars are waiting for renewed purpose as vinaigrette shakers, containers for preserved lemons, bulk spices, chutneys and jams. Or, they can help you declutter the fridge too when you fill them up with this addictively good pickled cauliflower.

Easy Pickled Cauliflower

This is ridiculously simple and decidedly moreish. If you’re the sort of person who needs a snack as soon as you get home at night, a jar of this in the fridge will be your saviour. It’s better for you than crisps (and extremely good with a slab of cheese).

If you’re not that sort of person, be advised that these pickles work well on a platter of snacky things and they are a secret weapon in a humble cheese toastie, especially with a lick of mustard.

• 1 1/2 cups white wine vinegar

• 1 1/2 cups water

• 3 tsp plain salt

• 1 1/2 tsp cumin seeds

• 1 1/2 tsp coriander seeds

• 1 1/2 tsp whole peppercorns

• 2 small dried chillies

• 4 cups cauliflower florets (about half a cauliflower)

• 3 spring onions, green parts trimmed, sliced in half lengthways

Put the vinegar, water, salt, coriander seeds, peppercorns and chillies into a large saucepan. Boil for two minutes, then add the cauliflower florets. Cover and simmer for one minute, then remove from the heat.

Pack the cauliflower florets into a 1-litre sterilised glass jar with a lid (or two 500ml jars). Poke the spring onions down the sides. Pour the hot brine over the top, making sure the cauliflower is covered. Let cool, then screw on the lids. Let stand overnight, then store in the fridge for at least a day before eating.

Very proud to have grown the chilli in this photo - which I found in a neatly labelled (recycled) jar in the pantry.

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Good Things

Image via Over The Moon Dairy

OMG this cheese is good

A couple of weeks ago a plant-based camembert-style cheese won the Vegan Cheese Awards. This flushed out a huge number of hitherto unidentified local cheese ‘experts’ who debated loudly among themselves on social media about whether or not this was in fact, a camembert. Honestly, people can’t help themselves, can they?

Anyway, this particular cheese pictured above is not a camembert either, it’s a Triple Cream Brie. Or, if you’re a pedant, it’s a Brie-style cheese made in Putaruru from cows’ milk (but the cows eat grass, so does that make it plant-based?). Next time you reach for an imported camembert or Brie, do yourself a favour and invest in this one instead, it’s one of the best cheeses I’ve eaten this year.

Image by Robina BM for Unsplash+

How to keep your crackers cracking

Since we’re talking about cheese we may as well talk about crackers too. Here’s a hot tip from my sister-in-law Jenny: keeping your crackers in the fridge stops them from going soft. This has been a useful life hack in our household, though it has not yet stopped Some People from putting the empty cracker tin back in the fridge. If you can crack that one, do let me know.

Hot stuff

This ye olde classic is a recent rediscovery in my household and we’re all hooked on it. English mustard is more of a punch in the face than the French stuff we’re used to (I feel like Dijon mustard is more likely to say something cutting than resort to fisticuffs), but that makes it a good wake-up for jaded winter palates. Plus, you know, the jar is a very elegant shape…

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Thank you for your company this week. If you do me the courtesy of clicking on the heart below, your jars will always find matching lids.

Have a delicious week,

Lucy