Chicago-Style Hot Giardiniera

Step 1

Place into a bowl the green and red peppers, jalapenos, celery, carrots, onion, and cauliflower. Sprinkle over the salt, and fill with enough cold water to cover. Cover and leave for about 8-12 hours.

Step 2

The next day, drain salty water, and rinse vegetables. Place back in a bowl and cover with the vinegar. Cover and again leave for another 8-12 hours.

Step 3

Drain the vegetables but reserve the vinegar. Put the vegetables back into the bowl.

Step 4

Add in the garlic, oregano, red pepper flakes, and black pepper. Combine well. . Pour in vinegar and olive oil, and mix well. Combine with vegetable mixture – if the liquid doesn’t cover the vegetables, add some more olive oil and vinegar in equal proportions until the veg is totally submerged.

Step 5

Pack into jars - I use a spoon to pack in the vegetables pretty tightly. Pour over olive oil to cover the vegetables. (Olive oil is pretty expensive! So sometimes I add a mix of olive oil and the reserved vinegar. It definitely tastes better when there's more olive oil than vinegar!)

Step 6

Cover, and refrigerate for a day or two before using (if you can wait this long!).