Pickles Pack Potential Power

Right now, there are two pickles trending. The first is the state of our current politics. The second is the tasty treat Christopher Columbus introduced to the Americas when he brought cucumbers here way back in 1492.

In India, where cucumbers are part of the natural veggie world, folks have been pickling them in salty water practically forever in order to keep them ready to eat for longer than cukes usually last.

How long the cucumber sits in the brine determines whether the result is mildly pickled or fermented. The mildly pickled, in water for anywhere from a few hours to a few days, get their tang from vinegar and spices. Fermented pickles get a longer bath, sometimes up to several weeks. The extra time allows yeasts, bacteria, and other microbes on the veggie’s skin to do a more impressive job, converting the cucumber’s sugars to lactic acid which contribute to that tangy taste and, various scientists suggest, enabling the pickles’ natural pro- and post-biotics to improve your digestion while they circulate through your body. As an aside, yes, you can get you probiotics from pills which often contain the same microbes found in plants, but not all supplements are scientifically verified. That is why University of Nebraska microbiologist Robert Hutkins has been quoted as saying, “Personally, I prefer to get my nutrients, vitamins, and my live microbes from food.”

Moving back to the fermentation situation, as Time magazine noted last year, most of the pickles in your neighborhood grocery are the mild kind. For the fermented version, you may have to make your way to a health food store and look for a label that says “naturally fermented.” Time’s other clue? When you open the jar, you should see bubbles on the surface, a sign of live bacteria inside.

The cuke itself is full of water which the brine draws of the water, leaving a vitamin-packed cylinder so, once you find these perfect pickles, they are believed to offer some health benefits. The research is still sketchy, with mostly South Korean studies. These, comparing people eating pickled veggies such as kimchi, the Korean pickled cabbage, with people eating regular ones, show several benefits. The list includes a lower risk of Type 2 diabetes, a revved up immune system, and increases in HDLS, the good cholesterol. The most surprising result is a link to lower blood pressure which is confusing because consuming lots of salt tends to send pressure up, not down. One theory is that the microbes in the pickles are working overtime to restore a balance. Perhaps pickles’ single totally provable benefit is that as a low-calorie food with lots of water that helps you feel full, they may be a weight watcher that reduces your appetite.

Nutrition-wise, the USDA’s mega-nutrient chart (Food Data Central at https://fdc.nal.usda.gov) shows that 100 g/3.5 ounces dill pickles dish up 14 calories containing nearly one-fifth the daily recommended intake (DRI) of vitamin K to help your blood clot and strengthen your bones. Add to that about 14 percent of the calcium adult DRI for strong bones and teeth and healthy nerves, up to 23 percent of the Vitamin C needed to protect body cells, 2 percent of your daily requirement of potassium to keep nerves tiptop, and about 1.6 percent of the daily magnesium that helps keep your mood magical. Yes, as noted, there’s a lot of sodium–80 percent of the DRI to be exact–but as also noted, it seems to work in reverse when pickled. Perhaps that is because people who like pickles would be the same type of person who would slready be balancing a menu with lots of low-sodium fruits and veggies.

By the way, if you’d like to pickle a cucumber or two at home, check out the short-term refrigerator recipe at https://www.almanac.com/how-make-refrigerator-pickles