Pickled Vegetables (Acar Bening)
This crispy, fresh pickles dish is super easy to make and delicious. It is also completely vegetarian.
This acar is a side dish. It works great with a chicken bumboe Bali, or a spicy rendang.
This amount is enough for 3-4 people and is done in 30 minutes.
Pickled vegetables in clear sauce (acar bening) #420 from Groot Indonesisch kookboek, page 341
Ingredients
1/2 cucumber
100 grams of carrots
1 cup of water
100 grams of cabbage (white, green or savoy cabbage)
100 grams of shallots or small onions
4-6 tablespoons of vinegar
herbs and spices
1 teaspoon of sugar
8 crushed peppercorns
salt
Bring water to the boil with salt, sugar and peppercorns. Add diced carrots for 6 to 8 minutes. Then add the vinegar and stir in the rest of the chopped up vegetables. Let the mix simmer for 2 extra minutes. This dish cannot be kept long.
Beb says that this dish cannot be kept long, but I left my acar in the fridge for a week. It was fine. It stayed crisp and the flavor was stronger at the end of the week, better even.
Because you cook the vegetables in a vinegar it’s preserved a bit.
This acar cannot be kept as long as an acar ketimun, which can be kept for months. I make acar ketimun myself as well. This is how.
I often make pickles with leftover vegetables. I always have a carrot or some cabbage left from other dishes.
This is a great way to make healthy, easy, fast, vegetarian food. It is great next to spicy Indonesian dishes.