The market has been bursting with these little bulbs since late last month and I couldn’t resist grabbing a few bundles for myself. Never mind that I have never used these young native onions ever, and would most likely have to root (no pun intended) around the internet for something to do with them that wasn’t too lame, I had to have some! I already love onions, and can eat scandalous amounts of them, but tempt me with pearly pink miniatures with sprightly green stems still attached and I am quite powerless.
So, like many market days past, I happily dragged home the unsuspecting items with which I had no idea what to do.
But can you blame me? They were so pretty and really begging me to take them!
And don’t you think they are so emblematic of a new year? Young and vibrant and full of rosy-cheeked promise?
Which is why it doesn’t make sense that I pickled them.
Was this my feeble attempt to try any preserve the dewy newness of the year? Or the youth of these onions? Or maybe I just need to admit, despite all my childhood protestations, that YES I do like pickles.
No recipe for now – I just threw everything together by taste with what I had lying about. Some cider vinegar and sugar, some pepper and dill seed, a sili labuyo (bird’s eye chilli) and some random fennel fronds. I boiled the vinegar and sugar, then added the onions (stems trimmed and peeled). I boiled them for about 5-10 minutes then removed the lot from the heat, chucked in the spices, poured it into a jar and left to cool, after which I stored the jar in the fridge – which is where it remains, getting more pickly every day and proving fair match for adobo, curries, and stinky cheeses.
Whatever the case may be, pickled or fresh, I like how these little bulbs look to me like hope and beginnings – and thanks to a little vinegar and sugar I have bottled that symbolic promise of better things to come :)
Hope...not too shabby a theme for 2009 I’d say :)