Summer is never complete without these refreshing Vietnamese style crunchy pickles! And they are so easy to make. It’s such a versatile side dish – serve it as side dish to summer BBQ (like cole slaw), top your rice noodle salad, add them inside your sandwich, hotdog, burger…. 🙂

Use any vegetable you have in the refrigerator. Even cauliflower and zucchini too. The classic vegetables that are used in these Vietnamese-style pickles are daikon radish and carrots. But today I’m using cabbage. If you’re a fast chopper, this recipe will take you 15 minutes!

Ingredients (yields 500mL jar)

• 250g of firm vegetables (typically daikon radish and carrots)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 4 Tablespoon sugar
• 1/2 cup (125ml) vinegar: I like to use Tafelessig or Apfelessig (both usually 4.5% acidity)
• 1/2 cup (125ml) room temperature water
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Steps

1. Peel the vegetable and chop them into matchstick shape.
2. Put all the veggies in a large bowl and sprinkle 1/2 teaspoon of salt over the veggies. Use your hand to massage the salt into all the vegetable bits so all of them have contact with the salt. Set it aside for 15 min so the water is drained out of the vegetable.
3. In the meantime make the brine: Mix the sugar, water, vinegar and 1/4 teaspoon salt. Stir well until the sugar is melt.
4. Check your vegetables. You will see some water drawn out in the bottom of the bowl. Squeeze the water out of the veggies and place them into a clean jar/tupperware.
5. Fill the jar with the brine, while pushing the vegetable down to make sure all the vegetables are submerged under the brine.
6. Keep in refrigerator for at least 24hrs. Tastes even better after 2 days. Keeps well in the refrigerator for  at least 4 weeks.

Love pickled vegetables? Check out my two other pickle recipes:

Crunchy homemade pickles

Korean-style cucumber salad