Giardiniera

Giardiniera is a common Italian term for pickled food, great to mix in salads. It is very simple to make however the process of pickling the vegetables takes around a month. A long wait but it's worth it!

Makes: 2-3 litres

Ingredients:

• Around 40 sliced olives
• 5-6 stalks celery
• 4-6 carrots
• 1 cauliflower
• 1-1.5 litres white vinegar
• 3 bell peppers
• 100 grams sea salt
• 1litre water
• 1 litre olive oil
• oregano
• hot peppers (this is optional if you want a hotter result. I used Adjuma peppers)

Method:

1. Chop all the vegetables (except the olives) in bite size pieces.
2. Melt the salt in the water.
3. Place the cut veggetables and the salted water into a clean glass jar that can be closed well.
4. Make sure to remove any air bubbles and cover all the vegetables. 
5. If you need add more salted water.
6. Leave in the salted water for 4 days.
7. On the fifth day substitute the water with the vinegar
8. Wait 1 day.
9. Remove the vinegar and tap the vegetables with a kitchen napkin.
10. Clean a glass jar and start layering:
1. an inch or two of vegetables, 
2. with a thin layer of oregano and 
3. a layer of sliced olives.
11. At each set of layers start pouring olive oil.
12. Try to compact the vegetables with a spoon in each layer
13. Cover all vegetables with the oil.
14. At the end make sure to remove any air bubbles.
15. Store for 2-3 weeks

The quantity display below (4 litres) is the original quantity in the saline mix. In the last steps the total quantity made was 3 litres since it's much more compact.

After this long waiting time the giardiniera vegetables is ready to be added to your salads!