pickles in 24 hours

A few years ago, I saw a recipe for miso-yogurt pickles in a (manga) cookbook that I own. I remember thinking that it was weird at the time, but I decided to try it out. And they are DELISH. And so easy. And they don't taste overly miso-y.

Traditionally, you'd make the pickles by sticking them in straight miso, but the miso flavor can be overpowering and it's hard to submerge the veggies in there because the miso is so thick.

miso yogurt pickles
1 c miso
1 c plain yogurt
veggies

Mix the miso and yogurt together. Submerge veggies overnight. Remove veggies, rinse, and eat.


Putting napa cabbage into the mixture.




Doesn't it look like Russian dressing?




So far, I've used carrots, zucchini, radishes, celery, and napa cabbage, all of which turned out great. And the pickling mixture can be re-used until the yogurt goes bad. Every few days, add a few teaspoons of salt to the mixture, since the veggies soak up the salt and it gets less salty over time. You can also use it as a fish marinade. It works best on salmon and firm white-flesh fish. Soak overnight, remove, rinse, and broil. Though if you marinate fish, you can't put veggies in there after that without the risk of food poisoning.


The miso yogurt pickles were part of my lunch yesterday.



top: white rice with yukari
bottom: local duck sausage, carrot, zucchini, and celery miso yogurt pickles; marinated and grilled tofu and radishes; kiriboshi daikon with abura-age