ATCHARANG SITAO (Pickled Long Beans)- KCC Theme for March

For this months challenge our host Erika of ivoryhut challenged Kulinarya members to "showcase" vegetables....the front and center. There is a plethora of Filipino dish that calls for just vegetables, i chose atchara which i believe is a favorite (well, it's our favorite) especially as a side dish for grilled or fried meat or seafoods.

Atchara basically means pickled vegetables. The most popular atchara is the green papaya which i love but i opted to pickle long beans also called string beans. This recipe works great for almost all vegetables, such as okra, radish, peppers and more.

Ingredients:

2 C apple cider vinegar
2 C sugar ( or less if you want it tart)
2 T salt
1 t whole peppercorns
1 lb long beans (usually sold in bundles)
4 cloves garlic, julienned
1 medium sized carrots (julienned)
1 knob of ginger (julienned)
1 medium red onions or sweet onions (julienned)


1. Bring vinegar, sugar and salt to a boil in a large saucepan.
2. Arrange all the vegetables, spices in a cleaned sterilized jar.
3. Pour hot vinegar liquid over the beans and cover.
4. Set aside to cool.
5. Place cooled jars in the refrigerator.
The atchara is ready in a day or two and will keep refrigerated for several weeks which never happen in our house especially during "grilling season"! Oh it's gone in few days!

Some recipes call for cooking the vegetables first, and that may be necessary if you’re canning them. But cooking them first makes for mushy pickles, so I prefer to skip that step. Just make sure to really wash the beans really good!  I believe the fresher the long beans, the crunchier the pickle.

Thanks, Erika for a great challenge!