After a very early morning wake-up call, I landed in Portland yesterday afternoon to spend the holidays with my parents. So far, I’ve done nothing but catch up on sleep and tag along to a pair of seasonal potlucks.

Though my mom is a fine cook, in recent years, I’ve become her potluck consultant (she claims that after a lifetime of inventing dishes, she’s out of ideas). Regularly, she calls me when she needs some fresh inspiration. And when I’m in town, it becomes my responsibility to help dream up and prepare our potluck contributions.

Knowing that more than a few of you might be looking for side dishes and items for shared meals in the coming week or two, I thought I might share what I came up with over the last two nights.

On Saturday, we cut carrots and parsnips into sticks (two pounds of each), tossed them with olive oil, minced rosemary, salt and pepper and spread them out on a cookie sheet in single layers. Roasted at 400 degrees for 25-30 minutes and turned at least once, they turn into crisp, caramelized nuggets of root vegetable goodness. To serve, I heaped them into a casserole dish and topped them with some chopped parsley, plucked moments before from my mom’s garden.

For tonight’s offering, we took a dish of mashed potatoes and kabocha squash. They get stirred together with beaten eggs, a bit of butter, chopped fresh sage and two kinds of cheese. It is ridiculously decadent and good. I think it’s perfect for a potluck, because it’s the sort of thing that must be shared. It’s far too rich to have for just a couple of people, but I crave it this time of year and love that I can have a generous taste while not being responsible for eating the whole thing.

I also brought two jars of pickles from home for tonight’s party, because I knew it was a crowd that would appreciate them. And I heard more than one person exclaim excitedly when they saw the jar of pickled okra.

How have the rest of you been handling your holiday parties and potlucks this season?

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Over the weekend, I made a batch of pickled cranberries for my Serious Eats In a Pickle column. I figured it was a fun, seasonal pickle and a good one to feature in the days before Thanksgiving. What I didn’t anticipate was that it would rocket so quickly to the top of my favorite preserve list.

I made these on Sunday night and I’ve eaten them in one way or another everyday since. On Sunday, I realized that they were nothing so much as a chunky shrub (or drinking vinegar) and stirred them into a bit of sparkling water for a fancy “cocktail” to go with dinner (though I love a good, boozy drink, I have a teeny, tiny tolerance and so often skip the intoxicants).

On Monday, I whisked some of the cranberries into some olive oil and drizzled it over a mess of arugula and goat cheese and topped the whole thing with a big of not-very-sweet granola for some crunch. That’s the salad you see above. It was refreshing, filling and perfectly seasoned. I think it’s my new house vinaigrette.

Yesterday, I made little stacks of baguette, clothbound cheddar and pickled cranberries, for a sweet, savory, astringent snack. I’ve not eaten them yet today, but we have so many hours to go before bed. I’m sure I’ll work them in somehow. Tomorrow, they’re going on turkey.

If you still have time before Thanksgiving and want to sneak more more condiment on to the to-do list, I do recommend this one. However, even if you can’t imagine the idea of cramming even another thing into your pre-holiday plans, I still think you should make these pickled cranberries once turkey day has passed. They are my new favorite thing and I think they just might become yours as well.

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If you’re a long time Food in Jars reader, you might have noticed there’s been a serious dearth of new pickle recipes on the site. It’s not that I stopped suspending fruits and vegetables in puckery brines, it’s just that I got a pickling gig with Serious Eats. Once a week, I offer up a seasonal pickle recipe in a column we call ‘In a Pickle.’ Starting now, I’m going to recap those recipes on an occasional basis, in the hopes that it will help you folks find something new and delicious.

Last week, I made a batch of hot pepper rings. The brine has a red wine vinegar base and the finished pickles are wonderfully tangy and hot.

Before that, I pickled up a small sugar pumpkin. I know that I go on and on here about how pumpkin isn’t safe for boiling water bath canning, but this is the one exception. If you cut the pumpkin in small enough pieces and submerge it in a undiluted vinegar brine, you’ve got yourself one heck of a tasty (and safe) pickle.

The week before that, I made three pints of pickled golden beets. Those beets were so incredibly sweet that I didn’t add even a speck of sugar to the brine and still, they are so sweet ‘n tart.

Quick pickled radishes. A fridge-only pickle so that they retain their crunch. Tangy. Bright pink. Good on tacos.

Pickled Seckel pears. They are adorable and taste like Christmas. I’ve made a ton to give as gifts this year (only to the deserving, though).

To see the complete archive of recipes I’ve cooked up for ‘In a Pickle,’ click here.

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You might recognize this picture. I included it in my vacation post on Monday. Several people wrote in, hoping that I might post the recipe. I’m happy to do so, though I must confess that it’s barely a recipe at all.

I have a basic formula I follow for quick, refrigerator-type pickles like this. It’s one cup vinegar (any 5% acidity vinegar will do), one cup water and one tablespoon pickling salt (sea salt is also fine). This is typically enough for a quart of pickles, which a little bit leftover. It can be expanded or contracted as needed.

Spices can be anything you like. For this particular batch of pickles, I used a generous tablespoon of pickling spice. Depending on what you’re pickling, you can add garlic, peppercorns, red chili flakes, dill seed, mustard seed, etc.

After you pour the brine over the veg, place a lid on the jar and let is sit on the counter until it’s cool. Once it’s returned to room temperature, pop the jar into the fridge and let it sit for at least 48 hours before proceeding to munch.

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I am a big believer in the concept of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) programs. If you’re new to the idea, the gist is that you support a local farmer by giving them a lump sum of cash to help them through the lean months. That investment bears fruit during the growing season in the form of weekly or bi-weekly boxes of produce for you to take home and enjoy.

I’ve been a member of several different CSAs over the years and sadly, they always left me feeling like something was missing. Ideally, a CSA should be more than just an opportunity to streamline your grocery shopping, it should give you a sense of connection and appreciation for where your food is coming from. And it’s a bonus if they happen to know your name.

Happily, I can report that I am beyond delighted by my CSA this year. The farm is Down to Earth Harvest and it’s located in Kennett Square (one of my very favorite Philadelphia-region towns). The pick-up site is my local Saturday farmers’ market at Rittenhouse Square and the farm crew is totally friendly (hi Robert, Phil and Shanna!).

A few weeks back, before the official start of the CSA season, I made my way to their table at the market and introduced myself. We got to talking and Robert asked me what I suggested they do with the glut of spring onions that were soon to be ready for picking. I offered a few ideas and they filled my arms with onions so that I could do a bit of testing. I tried pickling the white stems whole, but then turned bitter and woody (I now think they’d be better suited to a sliced pickle – live and learn).

My preserving mojo wasn’t entirely off though. I used this ramp greens kimchi recipe and turned the spring onion greens into some of the best, most flavorful, most interesting kimchi I’ve ever eaten. I took a jar over to the Down to Earth crew this last Saturday to try and once I assured them that they weren’t going to be painfully spicy, they were taken aback by how tasty those onion greens gotten (and here they’d been sending them into the compost bin).

I’m not going to re-write the recipe here, because other than switch one green for another, I really didn’t do anything different from what the Tigress did. I highly recommend this treatment if you’ve got a bunch of onion greens to use. I’ve started planning meals around this kimchi and I’m hoping to make another batch before the season is over.

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As long as gardeners stayed on top of their watering, this summer was a good one for growing tomatoes in Philadelphia (as well as up and down the east coast). We had a ton of heat, which turned bushels of tomatoes sweet and red. I got more than 10 quarts of grape and cherry tomatoes from the three plants in my tiny community garden plot alone.

However, out in the Pacific Northwest, gardeners were not so lucky. They didn’t get nearly enough of the hot nights and sunny days that make for ripe tomatoes. My parents got nary a red tomato and while they’ve picked a bunch to slowly ripen in the garage, they’ve still got a slew of green tomatoes that need to be dealt with.

For those of you who are suffering from a fate similar to my parents’, with mountains of green tomatoes heaped upon all available surfaces, I offer up this little recipe. My proportions are based upon a single pound of green tomatoes, for as abundant as they are out west, I had a heck of a time finding enough out this way to fill even two 12-ounce jars. A friend out in Lancaster County sent me a few of her spares, but they’ve been entirely absent at my regular haunts.

I’m grateful to have these though, and I hope that those of you who are swimming in greens find the time to put a few jars up this way.

Pickled Green Tomatoes
makes 2 12-ounce jars, or 1 pint and one half pint

1 pound green tomatoes, stemmed and cut into wedges
1/2 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup water
1 1/2 teaspoons pickling salt
2 teaspoons dill seed
4 garlic cloves
1/2 teaspoon peppercorn
2 bay leaves

Combine vinegar, water and salt and bring to a boil.

Place the following into the bottom of each hot, ready-for-canning jar:
-1 teaspoon dill seed
-2 garlic cloves
-1/4 teaspoon peppercorn
-1 bay leaf

Pack green tomato wedges into the jars. Pour brine slowly into the jars. Use a wooden chopstick to remove the air bubbles and add a bit of additional brine if necessary. Wipe rims, apply simmered lids and screw on bands.

Process in a boiling water canner for 10 minutes. When time is up, remove jars from canner and let them cool on a towel-lined countertop. When  jars are completely cool, remove rings and test seals by grasping the edges of the lid and lifting the jar. If the lids hold fast, the seal is good.

Store in a cool, dark place for up to one year. Pickles are good to eat after one week of curing. They are particularly good with sandwiches and stews.

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In the springtime, I approach food preservation as if it were an act of art. My jams are fussed over, with plenty of thought given to size of my fruit dice and maceration times. My pickles are packed into jars with great precision and accuracy. That time of year, I’m simply delighted to be anticipating the coming abundance.

Come August, my elevated aspirations are gone. I can to get it done, to get those bits of summer into their respective jars before the season is gone and I’m left with the potatoes, storage squash and kale of winter (I’m a big fan of all those vegetables, but they don’t excite me the way a peach does). And so my many acts of preservation become a bit frenzied and as easy as I can make them.

Take the jalapeno peppers I pickled recently. I bought a pound when we were in New York a few weeks ago because I wanted to bring back some little bit of the Union Square Green Market. The berries were too fragile and I didn’t see any garlic that was clean enough for my suitcase. Jalapenos are sturdy little guys and so I knew they’d withstand the rigors of the MegaBus. Plus a pound cost a mere $3, which I believe is the perfect price point for an edible souvenir.

When I got them home, I washed and halved them (please do get yourself some gloves to wear when dealing with hot peppers. I gave myself a humdinger of a capsaicin burn this time around), packed them into jars and topped them with a very basic brine.

I didn’t spice my brine at all, because I wasn’t trying to create an artisinal condiment or a pickle to be eaten on its own. I’ll use these peppers throughout the year as an ingredient in things and so I want the flavors of the peppers to remain clear and identifiable. Several will join various batches of salsa and most the rest will spice up pots of turkey chili.

The reason I like this kind of utilitarian canning is that by investing $3 and 35 minutes of effort, I’ve created something that will fill a kitchen need all year round. It breaks no culinary ground, but fills me with joy nonetheless. It also doesn’t hurt to know that I have something to turn to come January when my taste buds are in desperate need of revival.

Very Basic Pickled Jalapenos
This technique can be used for just about any small, hot pepper. Measurements are for 1 pound of peppers and yield approximately 2 1/2 pints. Recipe can be doubled.

1 pound of jalapeno peppers, sliced in half lengthwise
2 cups white vinegar
2 cups filtered water
2 tablespoons pickling salt

Pack clean, hot jars with peppers. Pour hot brine over top. Bubble your jars thoroughly by tapping them firmly on the countertop and using a wooden chopstick to release any stubborn bubbles. Wipe rims, apply lids and bands.

Process in a boiling water canner for 10 minutes. Store in cool, dark place for up to a year.

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I grew up in a family with a fairly limited condiment scope. We ate ketchup on burgers, grainy mustard on hot dogs and sausage and dipped steamed broccoli florets into little puddles of mayonnaise. Pickles were cucumber dills, either eaten whole as a snack, or sliced and blotted before being stacked in a sandwich. Jam was strawberry or plum (made from the fruit off our backyard trees) and salad dressing was Good Seasonings, made from the spice packet in the branded cruet.

This isn’t to say I grew up in a community of boring eaters. We were among the first people I knew to regularly stock teriyaki sauce and my mom liked to make the Good Seasonings dressing a little more interesting with the addition of balsamic vinegar or toasted sesame oil. Real maple syrup was the rule. In fact, my brief devotion to the fake stuff caused my father a great deal of anguish. There was always soy sauce in the fridge and we had a wicked pickled ginger phase after my parents’ early nineties trip to Hawaii.

In recent years, it’s been deeply gratifying to branch out beyond my childhood condiments (although I still firmly believe that ketchup on a hot dog is sacrilege) and explore a broader world of homemade flavor. However, until very recently there was an area I’d yet to broach.

Pickled fruit.

I toyed with a recipe for pickled Seckel pears last fall, but preserved them in a gingery syrup instead. I contemplated pickled blueberries, but opted to simply eat the last of my picking out of hand. I was uneasy about it, fearful I’d make something off-putting and end up wasting good food.

However, when faced with nearly eight pounds of juicy, ripe cherries from the Washington State Fruit Commission (thanks Sweet Preservation), I knew the time was ripe to pickle. I consulted several recipes and concocted a brine that was sweet and tart. I added a few peppercorns for spice and a bay leaf for nuance to each jar, packed the cherries in and hoped for the best.

As you might have guessed, my expectations were far too low. These pickled cherries are amazing! They are sweet and puckery, and despite the water bath, managed to retain a bit of that snap and gentle crunch you get when you first bite into a really good cherry. I am smitten. If you are still able to get sweet cherries in your area I highly encourage you to make a batch.

Oh, and one more thing. If you live in the Philadelphia area, there’s going to be an opportunity for you to taste these, along with a couple other pickles I’ve made recently, so keep your eyes peeled. More on Monday!

Sweet Pickled Cherries
makes five pints

2 cups water
2 1/2 cups white vinegar
2 cups sugar
5 bay leaves
7-8 peppercorns per jar
3 pounds cherries, washed and stems trimmed

Combine the water, vinegar and sugar in a saucepan and bring to a gentle boil.

Place bay leaves and peppercorns into your jars. Pack the cherries in jars as tightly as you can manage, but without squashing them.

Pour brine over the cherries, leaving 1/2 inch of headspace. Instead of using a chopstick to remove any air bubbles, gently tap the jars on a towel-lined countertop so that the bubbles rise to the surface.

Wipe rims, apply lids and process in a boiling water canner for 10 minutes.

When jars are cool, check seals. Eat cherries with cheese and feel joyful.

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Once again, I’ve waited until the last possible moment to post my Tigress Can Jam recipe. Motivated by deadlines? Yes, that would be me.

Despite my lack of action, I actually have been thinking about what to make for weeks. I initially wanted to do a red onion and rhubarb chutney. I even had a few stalks of ruby red forced rhubarb (purchased for my April Grid contribution). However, I left it waiting a few days too long and the rhubarb puddled in the bottom of the crisper. I took it as a sign that fate wanted me to do a solo red onion condiment.

Last weekend, I bought several hefty red onions and have been gazing at them for the last seven days waiting to be moved. Wednesday (or thereabouts), I decided that I wanted to make something akin to a bread and butter pickle (I’m a sucker for the combination of sweet and puckery). Tonight I settled down on the floor in front of the stretch of bookshelves that hold the canning volumes, in order to cobble a recipe together.

I stole inspiration from Linda Ziedrich’s favorite bread and butter pickle recipe (did you see that Linda left a comment on Rurally Screwed recently? I am star struck!), while using the proportions and cooking guidelines for pickled onions from So Easy to Preserve. What I got was a gently hued, softly cooked, slightly sweet pickle that I cannot wait to heap on a burger or suck down with a mild, soft cheese.

Updated June 29, 2010: These pickles are amazing on salads, particularly one built on a base of spicy arugula. Just thought you should know.

Sweet and Sour Pickled Red Onion
makes 4 pints

3 pounds of red onion, trimmed and thinly sliced
2 cups apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup water
3/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon pickling salt
2 teaspoons mustard seed
1 teaspoon celery seed
1/2 teaspoon red chili flakes

Fill your canning pot with water, submerge your jars in it and bring to a boil. When it has reached a boil, turn the temperature down to a simmer and keep hot until you’re ready to fill your jars. Place the lids in a small saucepan and bring to a very low simmer (you’re shooting to heat the lids to approximately 185 degrees).

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add the sliced red onion and cook for four minutes. Drain and set aside.

Using the same pot in which you quickly cooked the onions, combine the brine ingredients. As soon as the salt and sugar are dissolved, add the red onions. Stir to combine and remove from heat.

Remove the jars from the canning pot. Fill with the onions and brine, leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Use a wooden chopstick or the end of a wooden spoon to remove as many bubbles from the jars as is possible.

Wipe rims (even that small amount of sugar will make the brine slightly sticky), apply lids and screw on bands.

Process in a boiling water canner for 10 minutes (remember that you don’t start counting time until the pot returns to a boil).

When time in up, remove the jars from the pot and allow them to cook on a towel-lined countertop until they are completely cool (overnight is good). When they are cool enough to handle, remove rings, check seals and store in a cool, dark place. Let cure for at least 48 hours prior to opening jars.

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Look! A gift of pickles and marmalade, straight from New York. So often I’m the one handing out jars of food, but today the tables were turned and I was handed a couple jars of lovely, handmade goodies (delicious McClure’s Pickles and jam from Anarchy in a Jar).

This gift of canned goods occurred over lunch at Reading Terminal Market’s Dutch Eating Place with Cathy Erway, of the blog Not Eating Out in New York. I’ve been reading her site for years now, so when she tweeted a couple of days ago that she was going to be in Philly and was interested in meeting up with a food blogger or two, I got in touch. Meeting fellow food bloggers is always a such pleasure, because so often there’s a shared language and ease of connection in the encounter (even when shouting over the din of Reading Terminal at the height of the lunch hour). This was certainly no exception.

Cathy was in town promoting her beautiful new book The Art of Eating In, a memoir drawn from her experiences cooking for herself (as well as friends) and avoiding restaurants. After our lunch, she was heading to WHYY to record an interview with A Chef’s Table (Philadelphians, I don’t know if she’ll be on this Saturday or next, so keep your ears peeled).

In other news, I’ll have a jam-filled hamantaschen recipe for you tomorrow, as well as a recipe for orange jelly coming sometime over the weekend.

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