With our swiss chard plants ever-growing, we decided to start testing the pickling tradition, first with the refrigerator variety. We packed stems into the jars and added garlic and black pepper, then filled the jars with equal parts water and white vinegar. This is a very loose recipe and we did not so much as cook the stems for a few minutes, which would probably improve the pickle texture and flavor. But those serious pickling skills, with hot water baths and sterile lids and such, will come later. I got to wondering is swiss chard is even from Switzerland and it turns out that it's not.
Beta vulgaris was given that scientific name by Swiss botanist and it has taken the name of swiss chard even though it originated in Sicily. It was revered by the ancient Greeks for its health effects, and prized by Mediterranean cooks for the flavor it can bring to soups. Over the years, English speakers have referred to it as white beet, strawberry spinach, sea kale beet, spinach beet, Sicilian beet, Chilian beet, Roman kale, and silverbeet. Hopefully these chard pickles turn out tasty, which would be good news since they'll likely be the worst pickles of the season.
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