There are two crops I absolutely despise growing… I take that back, three. There are three crops that I hate growing. Summer squash, cucumbers, and broccoli.
The first two I value enough to keep growing anyway, and the third, the one I almost forgot, I give a half-hearted attempt every year and then find I don’t care when it doesn’t grow well because it’s been so long since I was successful, I don’t even include it in our menus anymore.
The summer squash and cucumbers though are worth overcoming the obstacles that the pest pressure creates. But the whole time they’re growing, it is a constant battle with squash bugs and cucumber beetles. It’s just a matter of time till one or the other takes them down.
Which makes my pickling attempts quite limited. If I plant enough, I can usually get just enough cucumber slices pickled for the year and by then they’re dead. There certainly aren’t enough to dabble in making relish.
And you know what? I’m ok with that.
Because I’m growing a crop over on the other side of my garden that is virtually trouble-free and abundant.
And it makes a mighty fine relish… Dare I say better relish than any cucumber-based one I’ve tried? Cucumbers are so perfect, and my favorite recipe out of it is the fresh cucumber radish salad.
That crop (as you’ve probably guessed from the title of this post) is none other than… Jalapeño peppers.
Because they’re pickled the jalapeños are zesty without being too hot. We use it anywhere we use regular cucumber relish, but we particularly appreciate them with scrambled eggs over the winter when the quick-cooking vegetables we normally sauté in with eggs have been replaced by slow-cooking root crops. Not exactly candidates for an easy breakfast. Also, learn how to preserve jalapenos for future use.
Zesty Quick Pickled Jalapeno Relish Recipe
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Zesty Pickled Jalapeno Relish Recipe
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 12 1x
Ingredients
- 3 pounds jalapeno peppers
- 1 pound bell peppers
- ¾ pound onion
- 6 cloves garlic
- 2 cups vinegar
- 1 cup apple cider vinegar
- 1 cup water
- 2 Tablespoons salt
- 2 teaspoons cumin
- 1 teaspoon yellow mustard
- ½ teaspoon celery seed
Instructions
- Wearing gloves to protect your hands from burns, deseed & core the jalapeño peppers then finely dice them.
- Deseed & core the sweet peppers & finelydice them as well.
- Dice the onion and mince the garlic.
- Place all of the vegetables into a stockpot and add the vinegar, apple cider vinegar, water, salt, cumin, yellow mustard, and celery seed.
- Bring it to a boil then reduce the heat to low and simmer the relish for about 15-20 minutes.
- Ladle the relish into clean half-pint jars with ½” headspace. Remove the air bubbles and top a ring & lid.
- Process in a water bath canner for 10 minutes.
- Prep Time: 20
- Cook Time: 20
- Cuisine: International
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Could you make this a sweet relish? If so how much sugar do you think I would use? Thanks!
Absolutely, you could and it will increase your yield too! I’m not sure how much though. I googled some recipes with equivalent amounts of ingredients and found the amounts of sugar to be anywhere from a few tablespoons all the way up to 5 cups.
In your video on you tube it looks like you are adding some sugar after adding the chopped ingredients. If not, what is it? It doesn’t look like any of the listed ingredients.
In the blue bowl? That was the salt (2 Tablespoons of it) plus all the spices. You could add sugar to taste if you wanted to.
What was in the mason jar before you added the spices that were in the blue bowl.
That’s going to be the vinegar and apple cider vinegar.
This looks so delicious. I really want to try making this at home, it seems like it would be a great condiment on a hotdog. What does pickling them do to the heat? Does it concentrate it at all or make it fade? Thank you!
The heat definitely doesn’t fade away but the vinegar flavor adds complexity so it’s not all heat. It’s great on a hot dog!
What was the first thing you added to the pot after the veggies? Looked like a mason jar of dry ingredient?
That was the sugar. I use evaporated cane juice which is just less processed sugar so it still has a blond color to it.
We had a Chinese friend who made a sweet japaleno relish we loved on hamburgers. Is their a recipe for that? It did not have vinegar in it.