Jul. 18, 2012 - Issue #874: Musician’s Survival Guide: Songwriters on Songwriting
Provenance
Six things about pickles
Despite popular belief, pickles, which begin as cucmbers, are technically a fruit, not a vegetable. The vine the cucmbers ripen on is the part that's considered a vegetable.
Something strange in the Kool-Aid
In addition to the usual varieties, Kool-Aid pickles are also popular among the southern United States. They're made by soaking dill pickles in strong Kool-Aid and pickle brine.
In quite the pickle
There's a dispute as to when people began eating pickles. Some archeologists and anthropologists believe the pickle was created in Mesopotamia in 2400 BCE, while others claim it was as far back as 2030 BCE. Historical references include Cleopatra crediting consuming pickles as one of her beauty secrets.
Just a little obsessed
Berrien Springs, Michigan has been dubbed Christmas Pickle Capital of the World. Each year in early December the town hosts a parade led by the Grand Dillmeister, who tosses out pickles to parade watchers.
Useful and delicious
Christopher Columbus rationed pickles to his sailors to keep them from getting scurvy during his famous 1492 voyage.
Hold the salt
Old-time picklers had difficulty accurately measuring the salt needed to make pickle brine, as the density of commercially bought salt varied year to year. To avoid the problem of too much or too little salt, which can cause pickles to spoil, recipes suggested using enough salt to float an egg in the brine. This method of measurement resulted in pickles, but they were often so salty that people had to soak them in water for days before they were edible. V vueweekly.com comments: powered by Disqus
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