Oh, Fudge, I'm in a Pickle

 Two things that I can't stop eating are sweet things and sour things.  Oh, ha ha, I just realized that pretty much includes everything.  Well, here are a couple of items that I whipped up recently.  I neglected to pick some of my green chilies and they turned red.  What to do?  I decided that pickling them would make good use of them.  I went to Manjula's Kitchen and found a pickled jalapeno recipe.  I thought the spicing looked nice so I started making it.  While I was preparing the pickling spices, I was also making some hari chutney and had squeezed a lemon.  The lemon shell was lying on the cutting board when I grabbed my red hot peppers and threw them down on the same board to chop.  The bright red peppers next to the sunny yellow lemon was too much to resist.  I chopped up the lemon rind along with the peppers and pickled them together.  Super hot and super tangy.  This was a pairing that was meant to be.  I ate them with an experimental instant utthapam.  That turned out OK, a bit dry.  I'll experiment further and post a good recipe once I figure one out.
It's Clementine Season here again and I felt the need to make something with them.  I decided to make some quick fudge flavored with the clementine zest and walnuts.  Yum.  Just the kind of thing to round out a meal featuring the pepper lemon pickles.  The zest gives a subtle hint of flavor and marries well with the mellow walnuts.  The clementine sections themselves never make it into any recipe because I just don't think I can improve upon them just as they are.  Although sometimes I do include a couple of them in a smoothie.

I had actually started out wanting to make Persimmon Fudge.  I had bought some persimmons at the farmers' market and I thought a couple of them were ripe.  I forget, they take approximately 25 YEARS to ripen.  I cut one open and it seemed soft and fleshy.  I scooped out the fruit and tasted it.  GAG.  Nothing worse than an unripe persimmon.  So, no persimmon fudge this week.

Lemon Pepper Pickle

adapted from Manjula's Kitchen

2 tablespoons coriander
1 tablespoon fennel seeds
1 teaspoon fenugreek seed
3 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon mango powder
1/2 teaspoon turmeric
1 tablespoon vinegar
2 tablespoons oil
6 red serrano chilies (or your favorite)
one lemon

grind the seeds and mix all the dry spices together.  Heat the oil and temper the spices lightly. mix the oil and spices into the vinegar.  Chop the chilies and whole lemon.  Mix the spice mix into the lemon and pepper and put in a glass jar or container.  Refrigerate at least one day.  keeps about two weeks in the refrigerator, unless you eat it all first.