Recipe #7
Pickling Red Onions
Thomas Keller Teaches Cooking Techniques
Chapter 12
I decided to finally tackle a chapter I’ve been putting off: Pickling. I enjoy a pickle now and then, but I’ve never been very big into pickling everything. Plus, I’ve always been a little shaky on jarring it and trusting a long shelf life from all the horrors I’ve heard about canning. But, Thomas Keller has led me here so I’ll go through with it.
He uses these pickled red onions on one of my favorite, easy meals of his: Chicken Paillard. It goes onto the olive oil dressed arugula leaves which, up until this point, mine have not had this topping that it’s supposed to.
I bought the exact type of jar he uses last week. I let it sit on the counter and stare me down, waiting for me to pick up the red wine vinegar and go for it. Today, it finally won. I washed it out, grabbed out my smallest saucepan, and turned on Masterclass.
Until I realized his pickling class didn’t show red onions, it showed another. When you go to Chicken Paillard, it mentions referring to the pickling chapter. Of course, it’s not too hard to just use the same ingredients he uses for the pickling juices and only add red onion instead of the multitude of veggies he uses in the video. In fact, that was what my plan had been. But, never having done pickling before, I needed more information. That was when I realized in the workbook, it refers to his Ad Hoc at Home book and says about how many pickling recipes there are in there. Well, I just got that exact book for Christmas, along with three other cookbooks from Thomas Keller, so I paused Masterclass and took a look. The workbook had the exact pages listed so it was a fast find. Almost the same recipe, slight differences. I went with the Ad Hoc version because it was just simpler but almost just the same as Masterclass, really.
It was a super quick and easy recipe. Cut onions on the grain in 1/8th inch pieces with the middle cut out. Stuff them into the jar. Bring red wine vinegar and sugar to a boil, then pour over onions. Let cool, then put in the fridge for at least 24 hours and up to a month.
When I looked up the comments for this recipe on Masterclass, I saw people mention how the taste changes day to day. So I’ll be updating this blog with taste tests each day until they’re gone, trying to figure out where the best timing is.
(Picture is before onions were wilted. All onions were fully submerged before the liquid cooled and was put away).
Mastering Cooking With MasterClass 
Awesome you tried the Pickling from the lesson. It looks good. Not really big on Pickling things as well. However, since I’ve learned to make vinaigrette’s I’ve always made my own on the spot for salads over the last year. A little pickling is good for some salads as well.
For me, one the things I do when jarring or making things in jars is to steralize the jars. Just boiling the container in a pot enough pot with little water so can cover and have it steam sterilize over 20-30 mins or so. I do it especially since I also make my own Creme Fraiche and need a sterilized jar after it’s already cooked to use. However, for pickling that may not be necessary as the vinegar alone with its acidic nature may render any bacteria a non issue. Still it helps to be aware, be cautious and safe. It certainly can’t hurt if can ahead of time to sterilize your jars if can.
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