{"id":6291,"date":"2008-04-06T20:08:03","date_gmt":"2008-04-06T20:08:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.grayblog.co.uk\/2008\/04\/runner-bean-pickle\/"},"modified":"2008-04-06T20:08:03","modified_gmt":"2008-04-06T20:08:03","slug":"runner-bean-pickle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/2008\/04\/06\/runner-bean-pickle\/","title":{"rendered":"Runner bean pickle"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This recipe is lifted almost unchanged from Delia Smith&#8217;s Summer Collection. She credits it to Kathleen Field&#8217;s recipe in the <a title=\"Abebooks\" href=\"http:\/\/www.abebooks.co.uk\/servlet\/SearchResults?sortby=3&#038;sts=t&#038;tn=food+aid+cookbook&#038;x=0&#038;y=0\" target=\"_blank\">Food Aid Cookbook<\/a>. I&#8217;ve added a couple of footnotes of my own and produce it here after promising to do so elsewhere.<\/p>\n<p>INGREDIENTS (makes around 6lb of pickle):<\/p>\n<p>900g\/2lb runner beans (weighed after trimming and slicing)<br \/>\n700g\/1&frac12;lb onion, chopped (or a mixure of onion and shallots)<br \/>\n850ml\/1&frac12;pints malt vinegar (but see below)<br \/>\n40g\/1&frac12;oz cornflour<br \/>\n1 heaped tbsp mustard powder<br \/>\n1 rounded tbsp turmeric<br \/>\n225g\/8oz soft brown sugar<br \/>\n450g\/1lb demerara sugar<\/p>\n<p>You will also need suitable jars. You could use fancy jars if you wish, but we tend to re-use old coffee jars, olive jars, jam jars and, naturally, pickle jars &#8211; anything that is glass with a good airtight screw-on lid and a wide opening at the top. Your jars should be washed and sterilised by first scrubbing them in hot soapy water, then rinsing them and placing them in a cool oven to dry and be warmed through.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Using a large saucepan, add the onions and 275ml\/10 fl oz malt vinegar.<\/li>\n<li>Simmer for 20 minutes or until the onion is soft.<\/li>\n<li>Meanwhile, cook the beans in boiling salted water for 5 minutes. Drain and add to the onions.<\/li>\n<li>Mix the cornflour, mustard and turmeric with a little of the vinegar to make a smooth paste.<\/li>\n<li>Add this paste to the onion\/bean mixture. BE WARNED &#8211; this stuff stains!<\/li>\n<li>Add the rest of the vinegar (but see below) and simmer for 10 minutes.<\/li>\n<li>Stir in both lots of sugar (best done in stages) and ensure it all dissolves.<\/li>\n<li>Simmer for a further 15 minutes (but see below).<\/li>\n<li>Fill your warmed jars and seal.<\/li>\n<li>Store for a month before eating. We usually manage to keep it stored for about a week before we succumb to temptation.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>My experience is that you may not need the quanity of vinegar suggested, as it isn&#8217;t the only source of fluid in this recipe. Some fluid will comes from the beans &#8211; how much will depend on how much rain you&#8217;ve had and how watery your beans are. If the beans are fat and juicy, you&#8217;ll need less vinegar. I&#8217;ve not needed this quantity of vinegar when I&#8217;ve made it, perhaps 75% is enough.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve also found that the last stage of simmering can be extended with very favourable results. It depends how you like your pickle, but I like it to be a little soft with the beans still nicely defined (not an amorphous gloop), but not under-done. So I tend to extend the last stage of the simmering to half an hour or more.<\/p>\n<p>This pickle is good with cheese but absolutely wonderful with cold roast chicken or roast ham. Actually, it goes with more-or-less anything. It&#8217;s very moreish.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This recipe is lifted almost unchanged from Delia Smith&#8217;s Summer Collection. She credits it to Kathleen Field&#8217;s recipe in the Food Aid Cookbook. I&#8217;ve added a couple of footnotes of my own and produce it here after promising to do so elsewhere. INGREDIENTS (makes around 6lb of pickle): 900g\/2lb runner beans (weighed after trimming and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-food-and-drink"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6291"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6291\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grayblog.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}