Behold: The lime pickle. Not the chili pickle, the mango pickle, the garlic pickle, the eggplant pickle, or any other kind of pickle. And certainly not that abomination, the “mixed pickle.” This here is lime pickle, the greatest and more exalted of all the pickles.
Man, me and lime pickle go back a long, long way. You see, in all my mixed-up, tri-continental, ruthlessly secular upbringing, desi food always held its rightful place. Now we lived in France, not a major center of desi culture either then or now, and this was before the globalization of so-called ethnic gourmet cuisine made the basic spices and ingredients available in all the world’s major cities. But we made do, and the key to our survival, desi food-wise, was the one line of prepared foods, spice mixes and achars on the market, which was inevitably Patak’s. So there was always a bottle of curry paste around — not to serve as the sole ingredient, of course, but to accelerate the process. And whether the curry was prepared from a paste or from scratch, there was always lime pickle on hand to give it the necessary je ne sais quoi.
To this day lime pickle is one of the essential condiments in my refrigerator — that and Dijon mustard (the proper smooth kind, not the grainy stuff), a combination that I guess pretty much encapsulates the flavors of my childhood. I find uses for lime pickle that other people don’t have — or so I think. Except I know that now, as I confess to you that I add lime pickle to my tuna fish salad, a whole bunch of you are going to reveal that you do the same.When I came back to the U.S. and started shopping at desi immigrant stores I was quite bewildered by the range of achars available, and the ever-growing number of manufacturers. I tried garlic pickles and coriander pickles and who knows what other kind of pickles, and found them ranging in appeal from heavenly to disgusting. Even within each type there is so much variation, in color and texture and smell, which you can often discern even when the vacuum sealed jar is still shut. There are pickles made in the U.S. and pickles made in the U.K. and pickles made at mysterious industrial parks all over India and Pakistan; South Indian pickles claiming additional properties that are indecipherable to my mongrel-Bong knowledge base; chunky pickles and pickles so smooth they seem to have been pureed.
I learned long ago to appreciate pickles other than the Patak’s of my childhood. But the sentimental connections linger. It was a pioneering brand and the first to make it big on the international market, even if the Guju-Kenyan owners of the Wigan firm had to drop an “h” from their name to make the pronunciation, if not always the taste, easier on the firangi tongue. Then a few years ago they had that classic family feud that ended up settled out of court. And now Patak’s is up for full or partial sale, for a reported GBP 200m, in order to raise capital to take it to whatever the next level is in the packaged and prepared Indian foods market. It even seems that Patak’s might be coming home, so to speak, as Indian conglomerate ITC is reported to have put in a bid. Apparently Heinz is also interested. Will we have a battle royal between Indian and American capital for control of the flagship achar brand?
Ah, for the artisanal pickles of our halcyon days. Anyone out there make their own achar? I’d be interested in learning how it’s done.
Brownelf, is the use of curry in the south really that common? I don’t remember hearing it as a kid in Madras, or among various Tamil family friends, hmm.
I find ginger-garlic paste perfectly good, no need to chop it up fresh each time – or you can blend up a batch and it keeps in the fridge for months, especially if you add some salt.
I dont know if anybody mentioned this but mirchi acchar from Pachranga in Panipat is sooooooo good Also a fan of green mint chutney made RIGHT
Panipat Pachranga is good, and back in the day it was the only kind of achaar you could bring into the US because it was in a tin. Actually, I’m not sure it was all that great, or if it just felt like it because it was a taste of hime.
Fish pickle sounds yummy, and perfect for noodle soups – they do put pickled radishes and kimchi in soups in Korea and SE Asia. Mmmmmmm. In Himachal Pradesh you can get really good mushroom achar and even chicken achar.
SP #51,
Kari in Tamil is very widely used. It is where ‘Curry’ was born from after the British came over. It is not just used for vegetarian stuff, but also for meat itmes like ‘aattu kari’ (mutton curry), ‘kozhi kari’ (chicken curry), so much so that in some non-vegetarian housholds ‘kari’ means a meat dish.
From: Curry
Kari, I read the wiki on “curry” a while ago as well, but it doesn’t quite convince – according to some linguistics blogs, “kari” in Tamil used to refer to something being blackened or grilled, i.e. just a “cooked dish” and not a liquidy stew. On the other hand, the term “cury” has older roots in England and apparently the first recipe for an Indian-spiced dish in an English cookbook appeared in the late 18C, when the Brits were not that well established in the South (only Fort St. George, pretty much, at that point, no?) and were much more likely to have learned their Indian culinary lessons in Bengal or the North. So I’m not sure about the direction of causality in the use of the term “curry.”
Prawn pickles are great!
Prawn Pickle recipe
Prawn pickle preparation
Goan style prawn pickle
Peppy Pickles, includes chilli pickle, prawn pickle and lemon pickle
Prawn pickle at When my soup came alive
Fish pickles
Another list of pickle recipes
As the mango season come up, here are a few mango dishes
Urugai many thanks! It’s been so long since I’ve had prawn pickle…but this afternoon that will change 🙂
Not many Punju responses…here are my favorites…all homemade:
I finally broke down and have learned to make all of the above. I can’t believe I resisted so long. They are so easy to make and taste so much more fantastic than any store bought stuff. (Though I’m addicted to Pataks Extra Hot Lime Pickle). But, they last a lot less than store bought pickle because my white husband eats them like regular food three times a day until the jar is clean.
Typically, Punjabi pickles use fennel, mustard seeds (always ground), cumin with mustard oil. They have a totally different flavor from Gujju or South Indian pickles.
sp
Siddhartha
If you are interested in any of the recipes for the pickles I listed, let me know…I can post them here or to you.
sp
Agree.
What I hate it is when “curry” is used as as adjective: curry chicken, curry shrimp. Or even worse, “curried”.
“What I hate it is when “curry” is used as as adjective”
how can you hate a word? :):) It only loves you back…
sigh. is it lunchtime?
SP,
The British picked up their culinary skills in India from all over. Direct Tamil contributions to the English vocabulary are ‘Mulligawtany‘ (Milagu Thanni) and Curry (Kari). Older Tamil food words in English through other languages include Mango (from Maanga), Ginger (Inji-ver), Rice (Latin: Oriza sativa) from (Tamil: arusi).
The Cury (from cure that you mention says it came from French) and meant medicinal concoctions that eventually became food concoctions that cured and hence cury, may explain the English spelling of ‘Curry’. But the pronunciation and it’s strong linkage to Indian cuisine I think stems from the English interaction with Tamil.
Here are a few more sources on the origins: The Origins of Curry
From: Curry leaves
Also see: Curry
Sonya
Are you being serious??
Never tasted or heard of any of those before — I didnt even think you could make achar with meat!
“Vindaloo or Korma or Rogan Josh or Madras” are almost all used in the West in just as generic a way as “curry” in your objection above, patm. Kashmiri Rogan Josh (with heeng, saunf, saunt) is worlds away from what passes for Rogan Josh in the US; a korma is really just a stew, and I’ve never seen a “Madras curry” outside the US or UK, and vindaloo is also much more popular and quite different in the US/UK from its Portuguese-Goan version.
I honestly don’t care if people choose to call that Indian food, or like it, and it’s quite apt that they should call what they like “curry” since it’s more properly a British/American riff on Indian food than Indian food per se. It’s when they insist that this is “real” or “great” Indian food, and they know their Indian food. Kind of like that cringeworthy NYT travel piece a week or so ago about “London, Where Indian Food Reaches for the Stars” that should have read “London, Where the Brit Fantasy of Curry reaches new Fusiony Heights” (because of course they didn’t go to the good Southall Panju places, but rather to the Of, By and For the Brits joints).
Someone needs to write up the posts in this thread into a single narrative, throw in an arranged marriage dilemma and send it off to a publisher quick time.
Kari, are there any proper linguistic studies of the etymology? Because stuff on the web tends to repeat received wisdom as much as anything else. Is kari used to indicate a sauce or any dish with rice in Tamil?
The term “curry” applied to meat, chicken and fish is now fairly common among English speakers in the North and East of India, but this wasn’t the case a few generations ago, when “salan” or “sabzi” would have been used. Any idea about the generational use of “kari” in the South?
Red Snapper, chicken and meat achars are very northie. And gobi shalgam achar, mmmmmm. And this thing called kanji made with black carrots and mustard seeds and left to ferment, mmmmmmmmmmmm.
Kari in Tamil comes from vegetables(kari-kai). Vegetarians call fried vegetables as kari. Meateaters call their meat kari also, very confusingly.
Ok – now you guys got me. My mum made the greatest Parsi pickles – even though the house stunk for days after, Tarapori patio – Dried Bombay Duck Fish Roe (Kolaji’s of course) Lagan nu achar Muraboo (sp?) – mango stones and all!!
mmm – mmm
but this wasn’t the case a few generations ago, when “salan” or “sabzi” would have been used.
Its still in use, atleast in my family anyway.
I hear you 100%. Still, it’s nice to hear others fondly talking about it. In my family, the 1st gen all love achar, but none of the 2nd gen do.
Actually SP and Siddhartha it’s not like I use a whole bottle of the thing. I use a spoonful to embellish existing sauces and find that concentrate helps my own mix of onion/tomato/ginger/garlic because for me it’s not always easy to mimic different flavored curries quickly I find the shortcut for daily life very easy, not like I’m whipping up curries on a daily basis 🙂
I don’t get your point. Any regional/local dish would be different elsewhere when made commercially. I don’t get the snobbery behind it. It’s still different curries. If they exist as different curries in India why can’t they exist as different curries here? That they don’t taste like what it does in India is a whole other issue. A stew is a curry sorry I hate that we are hung up on the semantics. Stew is not even a desi word!!
Red Snapper
I’m not joking at all. Meat-eating Punjabis pickle anything and everything and of course if it is meat or fish, all the more better with your scotch n’ soda or beer on sunday lunch. Growing up in India, all my uncles, cousins, and dad went for shikar. Whatever they shot, we would have a couple of fantastic meals and then my grandma and mom and aunts would pickle the rest of the meat. Eating game pickle with hot cripy plain parathas…oooh…my mouth is watering.
Of course, now, I’m totally opposed to shikar so no more venison or wild boar pickle… Many years ago, I was given wild boar legs a couple of times in the US by friends of friends and made wild boar pickle…it is fantastic. I haven’t used venison coz I’m a bit afraid of the mad cow disease which is now infected the US deer population.
You can use fish or chicken or pork but my husband who has tasted the real thing agrees there is no comparision.
sp
SP,
I am not familiar with any formal linguistic study on the etymology. The word ‘kari’ in Tamil is very old. For instance ‘kaai-kari’ means vegetable in Tamil. Vegetable preparations of all kinds including the suacy versions could genericaly be called kari, but will be distinguised as poriyal, aviyal, varuval, kootu etc based on preparations techniques. Kari-vepilai for curry leaves is also very ancient. In Tamil kari also is used as a generic term, whose equivalent in Hindi would be masala. I believe the ‘kari’ in Tamil and the north indian ‘khadi’ (poori –> poodi) share common origins nominally. The actual recipes and preparations would vary widely with time and place. Of course the meaning of the word like any other word evolves with time and geography and it’s evolution into the modern English usage of curry owes much to it’s usage in Britain, where perhaps it’s association became wider with any spicy, saucy, stewy rice dish and eventually with any Indian dish. Another link: An Introduction to Curries
One of my favorite foods ever is bellam avakai–any Andhras out there who know where to get it/ how to make it? It’s mango pickle where the mangoes have been dried and somehow incorporated with jaggery (gur or bellam). My great-grandmother used to make it; apparently it’s a much bigger production than regular mango pickle and you can’t buy it in stores even in India. It is the best thing ever!
Another yummy pickle: kalamakkai pickle from Kerala (made with mussels). Slurp!
The Andhra Pradesh fisheries used to make a yummy prawn pickle–I used to start sneaking bites out of the jar before we even got home.
SP #55
It may very well be true that kari started out as blackened or grilled, because kari also means coal. But even long before the British the word kari had evolved in Tamil to include a much more broader array of meanings. With the English interaction with Tamil and Indian cuisine in general, it’s meaning evolved even more in Britain into it’s present day version as I said in #75, that many Indians object to, because to some it seems like a simplification of the diverse complexity of Indian cuisine into just ‘curries’. The other dynamic at play is that though ‘curry’ comes from the Tamil ‘kari’ the predominant Indian population in Britain is North Indian, who are not as familiar with the usage in Hindi and other north Indian languages except for ‘Kadi’ and so quible with the semantics of it. Fact is, the English usage has turned it into a catchall term for all Indian cusisine, though the English can differentiate their chicken tikka masala from balti chicken (both preparations that evolved in Britain).
Sonya
Wow — I have to ask some people about this. And the meat stays good? I suppose it’s like smoking or salting or preserving it.
My guilty pleasure:
The lowly Marie biscuit topped with a spoonful of mango pickle.
So how come nobody mentioned the King of Pickles : the uber-hot Andhra Aavakai Urugai ? One bite of the crunchy garlic and mango with shell transports me to heaven…
…must stop now..drooling over keyboard
Overheard in the bunker:
“AMATEURS. Kadukumanga. Straight out the Grandma’s jar.”
😉
And I thought that spreading pickle on a tortila before slapping in the guacamole and fajita meat made me strange 🙂 I cannot wait to try some on a slice of pizza! You have inspired me.
And yes, I’m Tamil and we use curry to refer to pretty much any dish we make, and no it is not some generic thing that comes out of a bottle. I do make most of my curries (( so there) from scratch , but sometimes when I’m at work all day and at rehearsal all night, I’m happy to crack open a packet of simmer sauce if it looks good and natural. Better that than a PB & J sammich, even if it is spiked with achar.
glass houses #61 – LOL!
i find it interesting that the southies have somewhat ‘hijacked’ this thread, though i did find the tamil etymology lesson very interesting.
SP – my family is from madras, and yes, i think tamilians do generally refer to the saucier dishes as ‘curry.’ [although my dad has started calling the sauce juice – as in ‘just give me the vegetables – no juice.’ gross]. i have also heard tam-brams refer to curry as any non-veg dish.
i prefer my raw mangoes straight – my mom always buys extra for me to eat when she makes a pickle. however, carrot pickle is my big indulgence – i eat it straight with yoghurt. and even though i’m south indian, i can think of few things that are better than an aloo parantha, yoghurt, and some achar.
and now i’m hungry!!
i think most malayalees do the same … airachee curry, meen curry, kozhi curry, motta curry, moore curry, … all because of the gravy/sauce involved in these dishes … but this is not a hard and fast rule as there are other dishes that have gravy but are not called curries such as theeyals (ie vendaka theeyal) …
speaking of kannada words such as ‘bevu’– did any other peeps celebrate Ugadi on Monday?? HAPPY UGADI!!! eat that bevu bella!!! may you all have a wonderful new year!!
another good brand of mango pickle is Mother’s– and 777— the best, however, is the one my Ajji made in Mysore in 1989 and lasted us until 1995..I seriously cried when that bottle was empty. sigh.
==>I dont know the recipe, but I know its a laborious process. I dont care to know too, because I am getting some in May..yaaayyy! TWO JARS FULL. Anybody in the DC area, you can have one small piece. :))
Though, I am a veggie myself, I was told that Andhra prawn and crab pickles are supposedly heavenly. You get those in ‘military hotels.’
Huh…I don’t get it.
Red Snapper:
What do you mean:
Wow — I have to ask some people about this.
You don’t trust me 🙂
And the meat stays good? I suppose it’s like smoking or salting or preserving it.
Technically, the pickle is supposed to last 3 months if you NEVER use a wet or damp fork or spoon in it. However, the longest it has lasted in our homes is 3-4 weeks max.
The process is to cook lots of masalas (fresh garlic, fresh ginger, cumin, coriander, mustard, ground in vinegar) in mustard oil and then cook the meat/fish in this masala. Since the masala has lots of mustard oil, vinegar, and spices, the meat gently marinates in this mixture. And, no the meat/fish does not taste rotten or extra gamey. If the meat/fish etc. are not fresh or hung properly, then the pickle will rot. The gameness is removed by the vinegar and mustard oil.
The fragrance of this type of pickle is known to bring grown adults to their knees in joy I might add.
sp
It was Gudi Padava for us Mahrashtrians on Monday 🙂 Happy New Year to you as well.
Back to pickles I also love carrot pickle with aloo paratha and I’ve had shrimp pickle as well and between my cousin and I we finished the whole bottle in a sitting. It was yummy. And in Maharashtrian families I’ve also had Bombil (Bombay Eel) and tiny dried fish (damn I forgot the name) pickles in Mumbai. Very common especially among Malvanis and Konkanis.
Sonya I’ve had venison pickle myself and it wasn’t gamey or chewy at all. In fact it just melted on your tongue. I didn’t really like the taste of it but I did try it because it was just so exotic. And I’ve had brain pickle once at a Pakistani friend’s house. I know sounds gross but OMG it was insanely spicy and delicious.
No I do! Honestly 🙂
I meant I have to ask some people about this so that I can locate some taste it! I’m half Punjabi but never heard of it before. So I am going to do some Sherlock Holmes investigation and locate some pork achar ASAP.
I am a mango achar girl all the way. I miss my ammachi’s achar so much…I can almost guarantee that not a day has gone by when I haven’t had some jar of achar in my fridge whether I was living at home or now in my apartment…I may not have bread, milk or eggs but you better believe I’ll never run out of my achar.
P.S. my gross but delicious combo: garlic pickle and pancakes!
This was too mouthwatering to resist. One of my favorite offbeat pickles is bamboo shoot pickle.
http://www.bambootech.org/tslink.asp?subsubid=90&subid=29&sname=USAGE&lid=202
The texture of the bamboo shoots makes this on of my all time favorites.
Actually, Navroz, the Parsi New Year, also fell on a day really close to Ugadi/Gudipadwa this year. Does anyone know how/why? I’ve never noticed them being this close in previous years.
Amrita @32: I see the beginning here of a promising short story, maybe even a novella (at least). If you don’t feel like finishing it yourself, would you open it to all literary-minded SMers to finish it for you? Right here, extempore, on SM. Might be fun! We can hold off till Siddhartha sets the rules.
Since I am out of pickle and the five miles to Venice Blvd will take me 45 minutes which i can not spare because of AI results, tonight i will eat boiled rice while re-reading the comments.
Any west coasters (the desi one) remember taindli pickle? Gerkin in english? Zepellin in shape.
In our Goa-India-catlick mish mash our favorite was “pressure” pickle. Any Guesses
@Neale 93
Speaking of Goan pickles – 2 words – prawn balchao
I fondly remember begging, pleading Goan friends to bring back original balchao on their trips to Goa.
Here’s another happy memory :
My grandma made this wonderful temporary pickle out of karela , ginger , lime, chillies and salt.Temporary because it was not meant to last long and it tasted so good that it never did !
Overheard in the bunker:
“AMATEURS. Kadukumanga. Straight out the Grandma’s jar.”
😉
I scrolled through all the comments, just for THAT. I was wondering when ANNA was going to show up on the achar post. =)
This fish/meat pickle business is new to me, and so intriguing. Must figure out how to get my hands on some.
Though MTR is better. ;-P
@Neale 93, thanks for telling me what a ‘taindli” is. I am a westerner, but from further south, Mangalore. My mother makes gerkin pickle. More often now, she combines it with carrots. I would love to eat the salty gerkin left out to dry. An uncle of mine makes a pork pickle with garlic. My mother tried to pickle Bombay Duck once, but that did not turn out so great.
Kari – I see, the “masala” equivalent usage makes sense. A question for all the TamBrahms in the house, do you use the term kari a lot? Because I’m starting to wonder if the reason I never heard it from South Indian friends and neighbours was that they were mainly vegetarian TamBrahms. Hmm.
Taindli is the same as kundri, isn’t it? I jumped up and down one day to find it in the Korean grocery store, hadn’t seen it outside of Bombay. Yummilicious.
chachaji- I was worried that I might have been hijacking. As it was, I forgot to say, call me chutney mary if you like, but I’m not so much a fan of achar. I’ll take mango or tomato or even brinjal chutney over pickle any day.
I know/remember what else happened around that time and what that monkey chase led to, but yes, I am totally open and sparked at the thought of seeing it developed as a SM-built short story. I’d have to watch, as my memory would interfere with collaborative fiction — and I might use my narrative kernel later to develop quite another piece of fiction– what does Siddhartha say?
Yup and vegetables are just referred to as “pachcha kari”