You will hardly be able to buy fresh or pickled wild garlic buds in any shop. The only thing that helps here is collecting and making your own: the tender buds are reminiscent of capers when pickled. Also preserved in oil, they harmonize perfectly with other antipasti.

Wild garlic buds are a speciality

Wild garlic buds: an extraordinary specialty

When a delicate scent of garlic wafts through forests and green areas in spring, the time has come: the spicy wild garlic shoots out of the ground.
If you start collecting at the right time, you can not only harvest the tender and tasty wild garlic leaves, but also the still closed, plump wild garlic buds. They are pickled to become a particular specialty that certainly not everyone has in their storage cellar. You should have finished harvesting before the wild garlic blossoms glow white, as the leaves then lose their aroma and the bud season is over.

Sour pickled wild garlic buds

With the following recipe you can quickly and easily preserve wild garlic buds in vinegar water:

  1. Wash the wild garlic buds, discard those that are already opening and remove stems that are too long.
  2. Let the buds dry on a kitchen towel.
  3. Prepare plenty of vinegar, which you will later fill up the glasses with: vinegar and water in a ratio of 1:1 are brought to the boil together with salt, a little sugar and other spices if desired.
  4. Fill the prepared wild garlic buds into sterile jars.
  5. Pour the still hot vinegar liquid over them, fill the jars to the brim and close them carefully.
  6. If you want to be sure that the wild garlic buds will keep, you can boil the jars at 90 °C for half an hour. If you have worked quickly and hygienically, the hot-filled buds will keep for several months even without this step.
  7. Shake the jars every few days to avoid trapping air bubbles between the buds.
  8. Leave the pickled wild garlic buds to infuse for at least two weeks so that they can develop their full flavor and use them up within a year.

Soak wild garlic buds in oil

Putting them in oil also teases a fine taste out of the wild garlic buds. The following is a simple basic recipe that you can supplement with a variety of spices:

  1. Prepare the wild garlic buds as described above.
  2. Put water and vinegar in a 2:1 ratio with a little salt in a sufficiently large saucepan and bring to the boil.
  3. Blanch the wild garlic buds in batches.
  4. Mix the buds in a bowl with a good quality olive oil and spices to taste.
  5. Pour the mixture into sterile jars, fill to the brim with oil and seal tightly.
  6. Infuse the buds for several weeks and use them up within six months.

The garden journal freshness ABC

How can fruit and vegetables be stored correctly so that they stay fresh for as long as possible?

The garden journal freshness ABC as a poster:

  • as a free PDF file to print out yourself

Category:

Herbs