Pickled Zucchini Slices -- What I Make When the Season Turns and the Kitchen Is Still Mine

Week 493, and the apples arriving, the squash at the farm stand, the light turning golden, the kitchen shifting to soups and stews. I am 68 years old and the days have a rhythm now — the morning writing, the afternoon visits to Cedarhurst, the evening cooking, the weekly blog post — and the rhythm is the structure, and the structure is the sanity, and the sanity is required because the rest of it, the losing and the loving and the carrying, requires a sane woman at the helm, and I am sane, mostly, except when I cry in the car in the Cedarhurst parking lot, which is not insanity but its opposite: the specific, targeted release of emotion in a contained space, which is the most rational thing I do all week.

Hanukkah; Sophie's latkes; Marvin eats half a latke; declining appetite. These are the facts of the week, the data points, the things I would put in a report if I were writing a report, which I am not — I am writing a life, and the life includes the facts but is not limited to them, because the life also includes the way the kitchen smells at six in the morning when the coffee is brewing and the challah is rising and the house is quiet and the quiet is both the grief and the peace, simultaneously, and the simultaneous is the condition, the permanent condition of a woman who is 68 and alone and not alone, who is a grandmother and a wife and a writer and a cook and a caregiver and all of these things at once, always at once, braided together like the challah.

I made latkes this week — because it was what the week needed, because the week always needs something and the something is always food, and the food is always the answer, and the answer is always the kitchen, and the kitchen is always mine, and the mine-ness of the kitchen is the one thing that has not changed in sixty-seven years of living, from Sylvia's kitchen on the Grand Concourse to this kitchen in Oceanside where I stand every morning and every evening and many of the hours in between, making the food that is the chain, that is the love, that is the thing I do when I don't know what else to do, which is always, and especially now.

I brought food to Marvin at the usual time. The visit was what visits are now — quiet, steady, the feeding by hand when necessary, the reading aloud always, the holding of the hand that may or may not know it is being held but that is warm and alive and present, which is the definition of love in this particular year: warm and alive and present. He ate what I brought. He received what I gave. The receiving is the relationship. The receiving is the vow. In sickness and in health, in recognition and in forgetting, in the recliner and in the kitchen, the receiving is the marriage, and the marriage continues, one container at a time, one visit at a time, one day at a time, at two o'clock, every day, because the chain does not break.

The week was latkes — I know, and I’ll get to those soon enough — but the zucchini from the farm stand was sitting on the counter when I got back from Cedarhurst on Tuesday, and I knew it would not wait for me to be ready. So I pickled it: the slicing and the brining, the vinegar sharp and clarifying, the jars lined up on the counter like small, orderly things in a week that offered very little order. There is a particular comfort in preservation — in doing the work that keeps something from being lost — and this week of all weeks, I needed that comfort in my hands.

Pickled Zucchini Slices

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 10 minutes | Total Time: 30 minutes plus 24 hours chilling | Servings: 16 (makes about 2 pints)

Ingredients

• 2 pounds zucchini, trimmed and sliced 1/4 inch thick
• 1 medium yellow onion, thinly sliced
• 2 tablespoons kosher salt
• 1 1/2 cups white wine vinegar
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon mustard seeds
• 1/2 teaspoon celery seeds
• 1/2 teaspoon turmeric
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced

Instructions

1. Salt the zucchini. Toss the zucchini and onion slices with the kosher salt in a large colander set over a bowl. Let stand for 1 hour to draw out moisture, then rinse thoroughly under cold water and pat dry with clean towels.
2. Make the brine. Combine the white wine vinegar, sugar, mustard seeds, celery seeds, turmeric, and red pepper flakes in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring until the sugar dissolves completely. Remove from heat.
3. Pack the jars. Divide the zucchini slices, onion, and garlic evenly between two clean 1-pint mason jars, pressing gently to pack them in snugly.
4. Pour the brine. Ladle the hot brine over the zucchini, filling each jar to within 1/2 inch of the top. Use a butter knife or chopstick to release any air bubbles trapped along the sides.
5. Seal and cool. Wipe the jar rims clean, seal with lids, and let the jars cool to room temperature on the counter — about 1 hour.
6. Refrigerate. Transfer to the refrigerator and chill for at least 24 hours before serving. The pickles will keep refrigerated for up to 3 weeks.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 45 | Protein: 1g | Fat: 0g | Carbs: 10g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 280mg