Cranberry Uppinakai (Pickle)

Cranberry Pickle (Uppinakai)

 Havyakas who grew up tasting appemidi uppinakai, with a unique pickle masala, will never compromise with any other pickles. Here in US, one may not get the appemidi, but can make something similar. Pickle masala is made the same way and is common to all pickles. One can add the appemidi from  ‘MTR’S’ pickle (cut them into small pieces) to get close to our traditional pickle. Another way is to substitute marinated unripe plums or cranberries to the pickle masala.

 Cranberry is available in the month of November and December. Unripe cranberries are slightly sour and blends well for the Indian style pickle. Byadagi red chili is recommended, but here instead, available red chili powder is used.

Prep time: 1 hour

Cook time: 40 minutes

Cut and salted

Ingredients:

Cranberries (Unripe)           400 g. (5 cups) cut into halves and pieces.

Salt                                          40 g. to marinate cranberries

Salt                                          1 cup (260 g) to make salt water saturated.

Mustard                                  ½ Cup (80 g)

Red Chili Powder                  50 g.

Cumins                                   1/8  cup (20 g)

Pepper-(Kalumenasu)-        ½ tsp (4 g).

Ingu (Asafoedida)                 ¼ tsp (1 g)                              

Cloves (lavanga)                    ¼ tsp (1 g)

Menthe (fenelseeds)             ¼ tsp (1 g)

Olive Oil                                  75 mL

Coconut oil                             2 tsp

PREPARATIONS:

Note: Maintain dry conditions, use dry spoons etc.

Cranberries: Chop the Cranberries into halves, lightly using the food processor. Pour into a glass bowl and then sprinkle 10 grams of salt, mix well and cover it.  Repeat this for every 12 hours to add a total of 40 grams of salt in about 48 hours. This will marinate the cranberries.  Unlike mangoes or plum, this won’t shed much water.

Salt water:  Simmer  1 cup salt in 3 cups of water;  keep it aside to cool for few hours and then decant it. (mainly you are preparing a saturated salt water).

Method: 

1. In a large pan, place little coconut oil (1 tbsp), and add,  cumins, white or black pepper, Menthe, Cloves, and ingu. Lightly roast them.  Later add Mustard and stir it warm. Don’t  roast the mustard. Puree them using portion of salt water. To get a thick smooth paste.
2. Separately, lightly warm the chilli powder while stirring. (Ventilated place).
3. Use the salt water and blend the chilli powder.
4. Later mix all of them to make a paste. Pickle masala is ready.
5. Seasoning: Season the pickle masala , with mustard and hing frying in coconut oil.
6. Add the marinated cranberries to the pickle masala and mix. Add the olive oil to thin it out. (Don’t use coconut oil, it solidifies in cold weather).

Mixed. step 6

 
 Transfer the pickle into dry glass jars with airtight lids. Uppinakai can be preserved for months in the refrigerator.

 Plum pickle: One can add marinated unripe plums (in summer) to make plum pickle (step #6)

Appemidi pickle: MTR or Bedekar’s appemidi pickle has somewhat good appemidi dipped in watery salt water masala. One can take out these midi, dry them, cut them to small pieces and mix with above pickle masala (step #6) to make appemidi pickle.