Pickles

Stekovics – Salt Gherkins in a Large Jar

Stekovics Salt Gherkins are gherkins as they should be - wonderfully spicy, with a good bite, and incredibly delicious. Unlike pickled gherkins, salt gherkins are not preserved in vinegar; instead, they are brined and then develop their own acidity, a milder lactic acid, through fermentation. But let's start from the beginning!

Salt Gherkins – Fermented Gherkins

Erich Stekovics loves tomatoes, peppers and chilies, garlic, apricots and Mieze Schindler strawberries, but also good gherkins. On his farm in Burgenland, Austria, he cultivates an old French outdoor gherkin variety that was already grown around 1800 and is allowed to have contact with the soil, not ripening on foils. In the markets and manufactories of the French capital, these small pickling gherkins were used for making cornichons, but the Parisian gherkin variety remains crunchy even when it's a bit larger.

The not-so-small, spiky gherkins are first washed to remove soil and then, after removing the stems, bathed for a good two weeks in saltwater seasoned with garlic. During this time, something wonderful happens - fermentation. Covered with brine in a sealed jar, the gherkins remain outwardly intact, but inside, lactic acid bacteria, which are unaffected by the salt or the lack of oxygen, feed on the carbohydrates in the gherkins, i.e., the fructose, and excrete acid. Slowly, the jar becomes more and more acidic, and even the microorganisms that defied the salt now succumb to the acid. This makes the sour salt gherkins wonderfully spicy and long-lasting. Fermented salt gherkins from Erich Stekovics are a true delicacy.
Drained weight 600g, content 1000ml