Is there an alternate timeline where my home country is known as the United States of the
Pickle-Dealer? It seems unlikely, but there’s an element of truth to this half-sour hypothetical.
Amerigo Vespucci did not discover the Americas, contrary to what the map-makers who named
the continents believed, but his given name did end up lending itself to the so-called
“new world.” And Ralph Waldo Emerson once called Vespucci “the pickle-dealer at Seville,”
a derisive label that may have stretched the truth a bit, but pointed towards a very real
part of the itinerant Italian’s biography.
Before traveling to the New World himself, Vespucci worked as a ship chandler—someone
who sold supplies to seafaring merchants and explorers. These supplies included foods like
meat, fish, and vegetables that had been pickled, which meant they would stay preserved beneath
a ship’s deck for months. Without pickling, expeditions had to rely on dried foods and
ingredients with naturally long shelf lives for sustenance. Much of the time, this limited
diet wasn’t enough to provide crewmembers the nutrition they needed for the journey
ahead. This made pickle sellers like Vespucci indispensable during the golden age of exploration.
Vespucci even supplied Christopher Columbus’s later voyages across the Atlantic with his
briny goods. So while he wasn’t the world’s most important explorer, Vespucci’s pickles
may have changed history by preventing untold bouts of scurvy.
And pickles weren’t just enjoyed by 15th century sailors. From ancient Mesopotamia
to New York deli counters, they’ve played a vital role in the global culinary scene.
But where do pickles come from? How did the cucumber become the standard-issue pickling
vegetable, here in the States? And what exactly is a pickle, anyway? And -- oo sorry, I tired
myself out a little asking questions that I’m going to answer later in the video, so,
let’s just get started.
Hi, I’m Justin Dodd. Welcome to Food History. The verb, “to pickle” means to preserve
something in a solution. That solution is often vinegar, which is, at its most basic,
made of water and acetic acid. Most bacteria can’t flourish in highly acidic environments,
so submerging a perishable food in vinegar helps create a sort of natural forcefield
against the microbes that cause spoilage.
Another common pickling solution is brine, a.k.a. salty water. The brining method also
relies on acid’s preserving properties, but the acid isn’t added by the pickle maker.
It’s introduced by bacteria via a process called fermentation. I’ve covered fermentation
in our episodes on chocolate and beer...and ramen...and ketchup.
Look it’s kind of a big deal.
In the case of pickles, lactobacillus bacteria consume carbohydrates and excrete lactic acid,
so if you leave a jar of vegetables in saltwater, those bacteria will eventually turn the briny
solution into an acidic one. Vegetables soaked in microbe excrement may sound unappetizing,
but these bacteria and the acid they produce are perfectly safe to eat. They’re even
beneficial. Lactic acid protects pickles from other, harmful organisms, while lactobacillus
bacteria can boost the health of your gut’s microbiome.
Pickles of all kinds were a hit with the ancient world. It’s thought that the Ancient Mesopotamians
were the first to enjoy some pickled dishes, and Herodotus noted the Ancient Egyptians
ate fish preserved with brine. Columella proclaimed that “the use of vinegar and hard brine
is very necessary they say, for the making of preserves.”
But when did cucumbers enter the briny equation? While loads of websites and books talk about
ancient Mediterranean peoples enjoying pickled cucumbers, according to a 2012 paper in the
Annals of Botany, it’s actually unclear when cucumbers arrived in the Mediterranean
region. There are definitely early accounts that use words that people have translated
as cucumber, but according to the paper the texts in question are describing something
more akin to snake melons (awesome band name, by the way). The evidence suggests it’s
not until the medieval era that Europeans were able to enjoy a cucumber pickle with
their sandwich, as cukes made their way to the West via two independent paths: “overland
from Persia into eastern and northern Europe,” before the Islamic conquests, and a later
diffusion into western and southern Europe, which the paper’s authors peg to a primarily
“maritime route from Persia or the Indian subcontinent into Andalusia” in the southern
part of present-day Spain.
As the centuries progressed, pickles continued to win famous fans. Queen Elizabeth I reportedly
enjoyed them, and William Shakespeare liked them enough to reference them numerous times
in his work. He even helped build a new idiom around the word when he had The Tempest’s
King Alonso ask the court jester Trinculo, “how camest thou in this pickle?” Merriam-Webster
speculates that the Bard may have been playing off a Dutch expression that translates to
something like “sit in the pickle." In any case, being “in a pickle” is now widely
understood to describe any difficult situation, and—as Benny “the Jet” Rodriguez taught
us—has a specific, related meaning in baseball, used when a runner is caught between two bases
and is at risk of being tagged out. What would we do without the Sandlot?
Scottish doctor James Lind discussed how pickles could fight scurvy, noting how the “Dutch
sailors are much less liable to the scurvy than the English, owing to this pickled vegetable
carried out to sea.” The pickled vegetable in question was cabbage. And Captain James
Cook was such a proponent of what he called Sour Krout that he gave his officers as much
as they wanted, knowing that the crew would eat it as soon as they saw the officers liked
it. Captain James Cook: pioneer in influencer marketing.
But not everyone was a fan. John Harvey Kellogg, who as we’ve previously discussed was deeply
concerned about eating food with any known flavor, felt pickles were one of the ‘stimulating
foods’ that needed to be avoided, lest you succumb to…well, just watch that other video
if you’re curious.
For most of pickling history, people have added spices and aromatics to their pickle
brines. Ingredients like garlic, mustard seeds, cinnamon, and cloves all add flavor to pickles,
but that’s not the only purpose they serve. These spices all have antimicrobial properties,
which could partially explain why they were added to pickle recipes in the first place.
Dill, perhaps the ingredient most closely associated with pickles today, is also antimicrobial.
The herb has been found in Ancient Egyptian tombs, but it was hugely popular in Ancient
Rome, where it spread alongside the Empire itself. Eventually, it found its way into
Eastern European cuisine—and into pickling solutions. Pickles were already an important
part of Eastern European diets: They provided a refreshing and nutritious contrast to the
heavy, often-bland foods that were available in colder months, and it was customary for
families to pickle barrels full of vegetables in the fall so they would have enough to last
them through winter. Dill became a common ingredient in pickle brines.
When large numbers of Ashkenazi Jews immigrated from Eastern Europe to New York in the 19th
and 20th centuries, they brought their pickle-making traditions with them. A classic kosher pickle
is made with cucumbers fermented in a salt brine and flavored with garlic, dill, and
spices. There are two main types of kosher pickles: crisp, bright-green half-sour pickles
and the duller green full-sours. The only difference between the two varieties is that
half-sours have a shorter fermentation time. “Kosher pickles,” by the way, aren’t
necessarily kosher. Early kosher pickles may have been made in accordance to Jewish law,
but today the word is used to describe any pickles made in the traditional New York style.
Initially, Jewish pickle-makers sold their products out of pushcarts to their immigrant
neighbors. When Jewish-owned delis began popping up around New York City, pickles were a natural
addition to plates of fatty lunch meat. And today, no matter where in the country you
are, dill pickles and sandwiches are a common pairing.
As pickles became more popular, American food companies hopped on the pickle-wagon. Heinz
started selling them in the 1800s, and at the 1893 World’s Fair, H.J. Heinz lured
visitors to his out-of-the-way booth by giving away free pickle pins. The promotion was so
successful that the company featured a pickle in its logo for more than a century.
Some people, who are weirdos, prefer bread and butter pickles. They’re made by adding
something sweet to the pickling brine, like brown sugar or sugar syrup, and they generally
omit the garlic that gives kosher pickles their distinctive flavor. But where does the
name “bread and butter” come from? Last time I checked there's no bread or butter in the jar.
Although that could be pretty good. Ehh no I thought about it for two more seconds it sounds terrible.
It turns out it’s a bit hard to pin down the origin of the unusual pickle name. Some
say it’s a holdover from the Great Depression, when families would eat simple sandwiches
of bread, butter, and pickles. People may have done that, but if you’re looking for
a written record, it seems that one of the first known uses of the term came when Omar
and Cora Fanning registered to trademark the logo of their product, “Fanning’s Bread
and Butter Pickles,” back in 1923. GFA Brands, which at one point owned the company that
came to be known as Mrs Fannings, suggested that the “bread and butter” label came
from a bartering system the Fannings once used. In this version of the story, the Fannings
traded their delicious pickled cukes for groceries, including bread and butter.
Heinz was the business to beat in the pickle industry until the 1970s. That’s when Vlasic
launched an ad campaign featuring a cartoon stork who delivered pickles instead of babies.
This briny bait-and-switch would’ve been horrifying in the hands of a young David Cronenberg,
but as an advertising approach it somehow worked, playing on the belief that women crave
pickles when they’re pregnant. At one point, Vlasic even adopted the slogan “the pickle
pregnant women crave.” And that’s only the tip of the strange spear of this pickle
marketing story. A 1973 newspaper reports an ad of a husband telling his wife, “Sweetie,
it’s time for your 4 o’clock pickle.” Big no comment from me on that one. Even the
stork angle was part of a bizarre extended Vlasic universe mythology wherein life had
been good for storks during the baby boom in the United States. Once the boom ended,
the stork had to find a new job, and wound up delivering Vlasic pickles. The 70s: still
just an overall wild moment in time.
I’ve spent a lot of this episode talking about pickled cucumbers, but I can’t wrap
things up without mentioning a few more notable pickles from around the world. In Korea, the
pickle of choice is Kimchi. Like pickle, the word kimchi describes both a process and a
food. Kimchied vegetables are traditionally salted, covered in a mixture of garlic, ginger,
chili peppers, and fish sauce, and pickled in lactic acid via fermentation. Traditionally
kimchi is made with cabbage, but any number of vegetables—including carrots, cucumbers,
and radishes—can all be kimchi. The food is an integral part of Korean cuisine, and
can be served with almost any meal. Some families even own dedicated kimchi fridges for storing
their mixtures in the ideal environment for fermentation.
But kimchi isn’t the only fermented cabbage out there. Sauerkraut is a staple of many
European cuisines. It’s cabbage that’s been preserved through lacto-fermentation,
but unlike Kimchi, it doesn’t contain any seafood or bold spices. The name means “sour
cabbage” in German, but the condiment might not have originated in Europe at all. Food
historian Joyce Toomre suggests it originated in China, and according to legend, laborers
building the Great Wall first made it by pickling shredded cabbage in rice wine. The dish allegedly
traveled West by way of the Mongolian army in the 13th century.
A jar of pickled eggs used to be a common sight in English pubs and American dive bars.
Preserved eggs and booze may seem like an odd pairing, but it actually makes perfect
sense from a nutritional standpoint. Eggs are high in cysteine, an amino acid that your
body uses to help keep your liver happy. That means bar patrons might have reached for a
pickled egg to go with their ale for the same reason you crave a bacon egg and cheese sandwich
when you’re hungover.
Another common non-vegetable pickle is pickled herring. In Poland and parts of Scandinavia,
eating the preserved fish at the stroke of midnight on new year’s is thought to boost
your good fortune in the year ahead. With the success all things pickled have had around
the world, I can buy it.
Our next episode is about the origins of various culinary terms. If you know a cool story behind
some jargon from the world of cooking and eating, drop it in the comments below for
a chance to be featured in that video. Until then, this is Pickle Justin, signing off.