Pickled Garlic

Pickled garlic is great in salad dressings or as part of a pickle plate (try drizzling them with a bit of fruity oil). During dinner prep, they're great coarsely chopped and added to sauteed greens. When the garlic is all gone, make sure to save the leftover brine and use it in homemade bean purees or quickly dressed bowls of salad greens.

Pickled Asparagus

Pickled asparagus is one of the true harbingers of spring. As soon as it appears in your market, cook up a batch.

Garlic Dill Pickles

These garlic dills will forever change the way you approach pickles. If you've never canned before, you can make it easier on yourself and make them as refrigerator pickles. However, for those of us who love stashing away a little bit of summer for later in the year, canning instructions are also included.

Grilled Garlic Scapes

Garlic scapes coated with olive oil, salt, and pepper, then charred on a hot grill.

Pickled Spring Peas

These pickled peas are wonderful because they lose none of their pea essence in the pickling process. Instead, they just gain a vivid tartness. I've used them in a quick pasta dish and have a few left that I want to use to garnish my next batch of asparagus soup (two spring vegetables that go so well together).

Pickled Fiddlehead Ferns

Fiddlehead ferns are a fleeting spring delicacy. Found primarily in the wild, they are the fresh growth that appears at the top of a fern frond. The finished pickles are good served with poached eggs and toast, with runny cheeses, or alongside any rich bit of meat or pate.

Quick Pickled Ramps with Coriander and Chili Flakes

Ramps, a wild leek that tastes like an earthy cross between green onions and garlic, make an excellent pickle. This particular combination of pickling spices was heavily influenced by the basic pickling brine recipe in The Wild Table, an excellent book on foraged foods by Connie Green and Sarah Scott.

Pickled Dilly Carrots

These pickles are quick to make and perform miracles on boring meals. I tend to munch them straight from the jar. More discerning eaters should try them added to tuna salad or with a salad Nicoise.

Pickled Brussels Sprout Halves

These pickled Brussels sprouts include garlic, bay leaves, peppercorns and mustard seeds and are wonderfully zingy.

Quick Pickled Sugarsnap Peas

Though I like them raw or gently sautéed until tender-crisp, one of my favorite things to do to sugarsnaps is to quickly pickle them in a gingery, barely sweetened brine. I make them as a refrigerator pickle so that they keep their crunch and eat them with open-face sandwiches or chopped and tossed with grain salads.