Giardiniera — The Shape of Waiting, Preserved in a Jar

Five years at Amazon on Wednesday. I did not know it was my work anniversary until the automated LinkedIn notification went out, and then twelve people I barely know congratulated me in Slack in the span of ninety minutes. I closed Slack. I stared at my calendar. Five years. Half a decade in the building with the four-letter tower and the glass elevators. The twenty-two-year-old who started on the Amazon Fresh team is not the same woman who was writing kimchi notes in a Moleskine this morning, and yet she is. Both.

I told Priya I would go up for Senior. She looked genuinely pleased. She said, "You'll get it," with the kind of flatness that from her means the highest confidence. I went home that night and James had made dumplings — wonton-style, not mandu, because he's Taiwanese and I'm still learning — and I told him about the promotion packet and he said, "You don't sound excited." I said, "I'm excited in the way I'm excited about things at Amazon now. Which is, I don't know. Professionally excited. The excitement has edges."

I started a new batch of kimchi on Saturday. The tenth I've made this year. This one is with daikon radish instead of napa cabbage — kkakdugi — because Jisoo (I am letting myself use her name now, tentatively, in my head, as an experiment) supposedly made good kkakdugi according to the two lines in the adoption file that mentioned her cooking. I don't know if that line was meant to be information about my birth mother or just a note about her background. The file is full of details like that, orphaned from their context. "Birth mother reported to be a good cook." "Birth mother reported to be seventeen, unmarried, from Busan." Every sentence a window into a person I know nothing about.

David called on Thursday. He has been a retired man for ten months now and is, I think, beginning to understand that he does not actually have hobbies. He and Karen have been doing puzzles. He has taken up birdwatching in a polite, methodical way. He asked if James and I would come for dinner on Sunday. I said yes. Karen made pot roast, which has been her default dish for forty years. I brought a jar of kkakdugi and David — who has been resistant to Korean food for the entire time I've been making it — ate three pieces and said, "This one's not bad. It's like a pickle." I told Karen I thought that was progress and Karen said, "Your father is a man of careful enthusiasms." Karen's wit is the thing I will miss most when she is gone, though I am not letting myself think like that yet, though I already am.

Dr. Yoon: we talked about the shape of waiting. She said waiting has no shape, which is what makes it hard. You cannot prepare for a thing whose arrival is unknown. She said, "So you cook. You work. You love. You keep doing the things that have a shape." I am keeping doing the things that have a shape.

The recipe this week is kkakdugi, and I am very proud of how it turned out. Crunchy, tangy, properly spicy, properly pungent. I left a jar in David's fridge without telling him. I want to see how long it takes him to eat it. Or hide it. Or both.

David called the kkakdugi “like a pickle,” and I have been thinking about that ever since—the way he reached for the familiar to name the unfamiliar, and how that is, I suppose, what any of us do. Giardiniera is what I made the following week, partly because I had cauliflower going soft on the counter and partly because I wanted to stay in the logic of brine and patience and jars lined up on the shelf doing their slow, invisible work. Fermentation does not ask you to wait with your whole attention. It just asks you to wait. That felt like the right kind of recipe for this particular week.

Giardiniera

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes (plus 24-hour brine rest) | Total Time: 24 hours 20 minutes | Servings: 16 (makes two 1-quart jars)

Ingredients

• 1 cup small cauliflower florets
• 2 stalks celery, sliced 1/4 inch thick
• 1 large carrot, peeled and sliced into thin coins
• 1 red bell pepper, seeded and diced
• 1 green bell pepper, seeded and diced
• 2 jalapeños, sliced into thin rounds (remove seeds for less heat)
• 1/2 cup pimento-stuffed green olives, halved
• 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
• 1/4 cup kosher salt (for initial brine soak)
• 4 cups cold water (for initial brine soak)
• 1 cup white wine vinegar
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon celery seed
• 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Instructions

1. Salt brine soak. Combine the kosher salt and 4 cups cold water in a large bowl, stirring until the salt dissolves. Add the cauliflower, celery, carrot, bell peppers, and jalapeños. Cover and refrigerate for at least 12 hours or overnight. This draws out moisture and gives the vegetables their characteristic crunch.
2. Drain and rinse. After the brine soak, drain the vegetables thoroughly in a colander and rinse well with cold water. Pat dry with a clean kitchen towel or paper towels. The vegetables should feel firm and slightly softened at the edges.
3. Make the pickling liquid. In a medium bowl, whisk together the white wine vinegar, olive oil, oregano, celery seed, crushed red pepper flakes, and black pepper until combined.
4. Assemble the jars. Pack the drained vegetables, sliced garlic, and halved olives into two clean 1-quart mason jars, distributing everything evenly. Press the vegetables down gently to fit snugly.
5. Add the liquid. Pour the vinegar-oil mixture evenly over the vegetables in each jar, filling to within 1/2 inch of the top. If the liquid does not fully cover the vegetables, top off with a splash of additional white wine vinegar. Seal the jars.
6. Rest and marinate. Refrigerate for at least 24 hours before serving—48 hours is better. The flavors deepen considerably on day two and three. Giardiniera keeps refrigerated for up to three weeks.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 72 | Protein: 1g | Fat: 6g | Carbs: 4g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 340mg