Pickled Blueberries
Pickled Blueberries:
Unique, interesting, and intriguing on the palate, these Pickled Blueberries are a Spring | Summer treat! Very different than a standard blueberry, pickling a blueberry not only preserves the beauty of this superfood, it adds a tartness with malt vinegar infused with herbs and spices, enhancing the berries flavor profile. This pickling liquid brings sour | salt | spice to the sweet berry, creating more complexity and depth of flavor.
Many vegetables are pickled. We all know the pickle, the cucumber that over time becomes a burger condiment. Yet we don’t see many fruits | berries that are pickled. I’ve pickled many different things including Malt Pickled Red Onions, Jolly Pumpkin La Roja Pickled Cherries, Malt Vinegar Pickled Brown Mustard Seeds, Pickled Fennel In Pear Vinegar and Spices and more. Pickling is a wonderful way to capture the flavors of the season, to highlight them, preserve them, and use them later in the year. Try adding these Pickled Blueberries to a cheese plate, on morning pancakes, served alongside a charcuterie platter, in a salad, in a cocktail, used as a garnish for a wild game dish, roasted duck breast or sprinkle a few over a bowl of vanilla bean ice cream, just to give you a few ideas on how to use them. And the berries aren’t the only part of this recipe to use… The resulting blueberry infused spiced vinegar is a great addition to a salad dressing, sauce, or drizzle over game | fowl. These pickled berries have been used at some of my past beer dinners. I like to have them around during the offseason to add their deliciousness to a snack or dish.
To make these preserved blueberries both savory and sweet, with the sour, I came up with a mixture of different herbs and spices to be able to use them in multiple different culinary applications. Coriander, cloves, cinnamon, star anise, and bay leaves are pretty common ingredients. I like to add Szechuan peppercorns to give a slight mouth numbing tingle to these blueberries, along with the heat of fresh ginger root. Malt vinegar is my vinegar of choice as it has a wonderful balance of tart to sweet, yet stout and blueberries are a wonderful combination too (ever see a Blueberry Stout?!?!). Use this recipe as a template. Below, I have some recipe variations.
Instead of making blueberry jam or muffins, try making a pint | quart | gallon of these beautiful and super tasty Pickled Blueberries. At the peak of the season, blueberries are at their cheapest, making this recipe very inexpensive to make and add to the pantry. They make a great gift idea, a tasty treat for a potluck, summer get together or celebration feast. The art and science of pickling have been around for centuries and generations. It further shows the vastness of culinary science and ingenuity, to preserve a perishable ingredient for later use.
To learn more about pickling check out all of my Pickling Recipes page. See below the recipe for other recipe variations, to mix up this recipe.
Makes: 1 pound
| Servings | Prep Time |
| 32 servings | 5 minute |
| Cook Time | Passive Time |
| 5 minute | 1 day |
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Learn how to make pickled blueberries, perfect for a cheese plate, charcuterie platter, salad, garnish for wild game, and more.
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- 1 1/2 cup vinegar, malt
- 1/2 cup sugar, brown, light
- 1/2 cup honey
- 6 each cloves
- 3 each star anise pods
- 2 each bay leaves preferably fresh
- 2 each cinnamon sticks
- 2 tablespoon coriander seeds
- 1 tablespoon Szechuan peppercorns
- 1 teaspoon salt, kosher
- 4 coins ginger, root, about 1/2 - 2/3 of an inch piece
- 16 ounce blueberries, fresh picked through and washed
- Combine the malt vinegar, brown sugar, honey, cloves, ginger, star anise, bay leaves, cinnamon sticks, coriander, Szechuan peppercorns, salt, and ginger in a non-reactive pot and bring to a boil.
- Washed and dried the blueberries, placing them into a mason | ball jar. Pour the hot vinegar mixture over berries, filing the mason jar 1/4 inch from the rim. Wipe the rim of the jar with a damp vinegar or bleach paper towel and seal with a lid. Allow too steep for at least 30 minutes. Leave to cool or until they reach room temperature. Then transfer to the refrigerate for at least 1 day to pickle before using. They will last 1 year in the refrigerator.
- If you want these Pickled Blueberries to be in your dry pantry, they must be canned. To do this, add just filled and sealed (as mentioned in the step above) to a canning pot, filled with water coming up the sides of the jar to about 3/4 of the way up. Bring the water to a boil, then reduce the heat to a simmer. Cook the berries for 15 minutes, then remove from the water bath onto a cooling rack to cool. As they come to room temperature, the lids should 'pop' and seal. This can be checked, by pressing the lid. The lid should be indented and not pop, showing it's been sealed.
- Strain the blueberries before serving, removing the vinegar and spices. They can be used with a cheese platter, charcuterie platter, or served in a sauce for wild game. Once opened, they will keep for up to a year in the refrigerator.
Pickled Blueberries Recipe Variations:
- Add the zest of one Meyer Lemon, to add that citrus brightness, so infused into our memories of flavor
- Substitute 1/2 cup of malt vinegar for a stout, to make a Stout Pickled Blueberry recipe
- If you can't find Szechuan peppercorns, substitute black peppercorns
More Pickled Recipes:
