This Is The Best And Authentic Mixed Vegetable Pickle Recipe

WFY Bureau Desk | FROM THE KITCHENS OF INDIA | August 2025 Edition

We are a pickle nation, no doubt about that.

Pickles or “achaar” in Hindi, are a deeply ingrained part of Indian cuisine and culture, with a wide variety of flavours and regional specialties.

Each region in India boasts of its own unique pickle recipes and flavours that largely reflect local ingredients and household culinary traditions. 

I grew up watching my mother and grandmother prepare achaar at the start of every summer. Hand-held raw mango cutter that had a heavy knife attached to a narrow wooden plank in the bottom would be used to chop raw mangoes. The kitchen would turn into a mini spice factory with raw mangoes, carrots, and chilies, etc., being chopped and sun-dried, hard-working hands mixing in flavourful, aromatic masalas, the heavy scent of mustard oil filling the air, etc. All this wasn’t just about preserving food, it was a summer time ritual of special recipes of love. We as kids, would be involved in doing small jobs that we delightfully thought contributed largely to the making of pickles. 

Well, being married to a Bengali comes with its own advantages, especially when the spouse is a chef of sorts.  Yes, my hubby is very good in preparing meals which includes pickles, chutnies, desserts and what have you. 

Here, I would like to highlight one such recipe of my husband which is the mixed vegetable pickle.

MIXD VEG PICKLE

1) Cut the following veggies:

Green chillies  – medium cuts.
Carrots and Ginger juliennes and microwave for about 2 mins.
Garlic whole pods.
Lemons….boil uncut lemons in cooker for 1 whistle. Then cut the boiled lemons into 6 to 8 pieces each.
Goose berries- boil in cooker for 1 whistle and deseed and cut into 4 pieces each. You can boil lemons and goose berries together in the cooker.                         
                                      
2) For the masala:

Jeera-1 teaspoon
Meethi-1 1/2 teaspoon
Saunf – 3 teaspoon
Yellow mustard – 3 teaspoon

Roast the above spices together for 2 minutes and grind coarsely.

Add hing 1/4 tsp to it.

3) Heat Mustard oil till it smokes. Remove from heat

4) In a bowl, put the veggies and add the following:  Mustard oil, vinegar 1 tspn, roasted and ground masala, red chilli powder 1 tspn, turmeric powder 1 tspn and salt.  Stir well and refrigerate for 3 days before use. Store in fridge. Salt and oil are used to preserve the ingredients, so go easy on them. 

Use sterilized, dry jars for storage of pickles.

Although one can buy pickles of varieties, there is nothing as good as one’s homemade pickles.

So every time you open that jar, let the aroma remind you not just of food, but of the hardworking and loving hands that made it…. your mother,  your grandmother,  your spouse… your loved ones.  Happy pickling.

Thanks, 

Sudha Mukhopadhyay