Malaysian inspired pickled courgettes

Method:

Start by cutting your courgettes into little cubes, pop them into a bowl with your salt and mix well, cover and leave it overnight (this is the brining process, your courgettes will render a lot of water that way).

The next day, rinse your courgettes in cold water ( I do this seven times to get rid of the excess salt, you want your courgettes to reach that sweet but not too salty taste). Once that’s done, you also want to drain the excess water. I do this by transferring the courgettes to a colander with a plate over them and something heavy on top. Leave for 5 minutes at least or until no water comes out. Then heat a tbsp of vegetable oil in a pan, add your mustard seeds, when they start popping, add the ginger, the garlic, chilli flakes and the turmeric and stir for a minute constantly as you don’t want your garlic to burn, then pour the vinegar and add the sugar, bring to the boil and turn the heat off, let this cool completely.

Once cooled start adding your courgettes into sterilised jars one layer at a time, then add some of the spices on top, then a bit of the vinegar and repeat this process until the jar is full. This process allows you to have an even distribution of spices, vinegar and courgettes in the jar. If you don’t do that you end-up with all the spices at the top of your jar. That is it!

You can either leave these jars for 6 months or consume after a week with cold meat, sausage roll, ham or even a good old scotch egg. It’s truly delicious!

Last year I went for courgettes fritters you can find the recipe here