Daikon Pickles

One of my favorite things to make at work is pickles. There are endless variations of vinegars, vegetables and seasonings to add to make endless variations of pickles. I have been pondering using fresh herbs in pickles for a long time, so I decided to infuse rice wine vinegar with mint for this version. Be careful, making pickles makes your house smell of vinegar, so you should do it on a day when you can open up the windows and air it out.
If you aren't familiar with daikon, it is a root vegetable shaped like a large, blunt carrot that is white and relatively mild with a little kick of spiciness.

12oz Rice Wine Vinegar
1/2 bunch of mint

Put vinegar and mint (stems and all) in a non-reactive (stainless steel or non-stick) in a saucepan and bring up to a boil. Remove from heat, cover and let sit 20 minutes.

12oz water
1 T coriander seed
1 cinnamon stick

3 cups daikon, peeled and chopped into uniform shapes (I cut them into half moons)

1/4 cup chopped green onions
1/4 cup salt, preferably non-iodized, sea salt or kosher salt (iodized salt will make your pickles taste bad)
1/4 cup sugar

Heat a large non-reactive stock pot. Add spices and toast until fragrant (maybe for a minute or so). Add the water. Strain mint-vinegar into stock pot and discard mint. Add the remaining ingredients and boil for 5 minutes. The pickles will continue to cook until the brine cools completely, so you want them not quite done when you pull them from the heat. Taste them. When they are just a little too cruchy for your taste, pull them off the heat.

Remember, hot pickles will taste different than they will when cool. Once cool, store them in the refrigerator with all of the brine and seasonings. Over time, the seasonings will impart more flavor to the pickles. These should last for about a month. This is a fairly salty pickle, so feel free to reduce the amount of salt or add more sugar.

These are great eaten from the jar or sliced and put on salads.