What's In My Frig?

Occasionally you might see me blog a recipe that calls for just half a sweet onion. I’m the Single Guy, so that means my recipes don’t call for a lot of any one ingredient.

With half an onion bulb in my frig, I often end up having to make another dish that might require onions. Let’s say, a risotto perhaps. Or maybe the base for a tomato sauce, maybe? But this week, after using half a red onion for a small pot of chili, I decided to turn the remaining half into pickled onions.

I made this the first time when I was competing in last year’s Turkey Cook-Off at the San Francisco Chronicle. It was pretty easy, and a nice complement to any rich-tasting food. (In the Chronicle competition, the pickled onions topped off a plate of green beans cooked into bacon fat.) This time I did it from memory and you know I don’t have a good memory so I’m sure I missed a few steps. It still turned out fine.

The trick is having a mandolin so you can thinly slice the onion. Then I just placed the slices in a jar with 2/3 cup red wine vinegar, 2 tablespoon of sugar, a pinch of kosher salt and a ¼ cup of water. (You have to use red wine vinegar to give it that nice pink color, or else it’ll just look sad.) Then I just let it marinade in the refrigerator, and now I use it as a garnish for other dishes or for my pulled pork sandwiches. It’s also very pretty to look at when I open my frig.