Zippy Zucchini Relish

This home-canned zucchini relish makes for a great hot dog, burger or sausage-on-a-bun relish with just enough zip to give some interest.

You can make this at any time of year using zucchini (aka courgette) fresh from the market; in fact, it’s nice to have some ready to go for the summer.

This is a tested recipe from Bernardin. It also appears in Linda Ziedrich and Canadian Living in very similar versions.

This recipe makes a lot; you may wish to cut it in half.

The recipe

If you wish to adjust batch size, do the math first on paper.

Jar size choices: Quarter-litre (½ US pint / 250 ml / 8 oz) OR half-litre (1 US pint / 500 ml/ 16 oz)

Processing method: Either water-bath or steam canning

Yield: 6 x half-litre (US pint) jars

Headspace: 2 cm (½ inch)

Processing time: 10 minutes for quarter-litre (½ US pint); 15 minutes for half-litre (US pint)

3.96 from 23 votes

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Zippy Zucchini Relish

Yield: 6 x half-litre (US pint) jars

Course Condiments

Cuisine American

Keyword Relish, Zucchini

Prep Time 1 hour

Cook Time 1 hour

Total Time 2 hours

Yield 6 x half-litre (US pint) jars

Calories 31 kcal

Ingredients

• 2 kg zucchini (grated. 12 cups / 4.5 lbs)
• 600 g onion (chopped. 4 cups. Measurements done after peeling, chopping. About 4 to 5 medium-large onions)
• 300 g red bell pepper (chopped. 2 cups. Measurements done after seeding, chopping. 2 large)
• 150 g green bell pepper (chopped. 1 cup. Measurements done after seeding, chopping. 1 large)
• 1 hot pepper (chopped. Large, with seeds)
• 125 g pickling salt (⅓ cup / 4 oz)
• 1 tablespoon nutmeg (ground)
• 1 tablespoon turmeric
• 1 stick cinnamon (10 cm / 4 inch. Optional)
• 500 g sugar (white. 2 ½ cups / 1 ¼ lbs) OR 3 teaspoons liquid stevia
• 625 ml white vinegar (5% acidity or higher. 2 ½ cups / 20 oz)
• 4 tablespoons prepared horseradish

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

1. Put prepped veg in a large bowl. Sprinkle with salt OR salt sub, toss gently.
2. Let stand 12 hours in fridge, then drain.
3. Put veg in a large pot about 8 litres (8 US quarts) in size.
4. Add all the remaining ingredients except the ginger.
5. Stir well, bring to a boil, then lower to a simmer for 50 minutes or until thickened.
6. Discard the cinnamon stick and stir in the ginger.
7. Pack hot into quarter-litre (½ US pint) jars or half-litre (US pint) jars.
8. Leave 2 cm (½ inch) headspace.
9. Debubble, adjust headspace.
10. Wipe jar rims.
11. Put lids on.
12. Process in a water bath or steam canner.
13. Process 10 minutes for quarter-litre (½ US pint); 15 minutes for half-litre (US pint). Increase time as needed for your altitude.
14. Best after at least a month of jar time.

Reference information

How to water bath process.

How to steam can.

When water-bath canning or steam canning, you must adjust the processing time for your altitude.

Australia and New Zealand vinegar strength special notes.

Recipe notes

• Instead of the horseradish, you can use tablespoons fresh-grated ginger root (or from a tube), or ½ teaspoon ground ginger. Or ½ to 1 teaspoon dried chile flake.
• Instead of the salt, you can use a non-bitter, non-clouding salt sub. We have found Herbamare Sodium-Free performs well in that regard.
• You can reduce the sugar, or use the same volume amount of granulated Splenda®, or use 2 ½ teaspoons of liquid stevia. For stevia, we’d recommend Better Stevia liquid stevia .
• You don’t want to took this too thick: don’t try to boil all the liquid out of it because it will thicken a bit when cool.
• The centres of large zucchini can be seedy and spongy. Cut that out before using.
• If large pieces of skin from large zucchini get caught in the grater, pull those out and discard as they will likely be tough. Small slivers of the skin will be fine, though.

Recipe source

Bernardin Guide to Home Preserving. Toronto, Canada: Bernardin Ltd. 2013. Page 78. (Provides processing times for both jar sizes.)

Ziedrich, Linda. The Joy of Pickling. Boston, Massachusetts: The Harvard Common Press. 2009. Page 314.

Bernardin uses horseradish for zip, but we feel that heated horseradish loses most of its flavour because the flavour compounds are heat volatile: for zip, Linda Ziedrich uses instead fresh ginger and cinnamon. We have given those as options.

Note: a Canadian Living version uses dried chile flake instead of the horseradish for the zip.

Modifications made:

• Added options for ginger and cinnamon;

Nutrition information

Regular version

Per 2 tablespoons / 30 ml

• 31 calories, 487 mg sodium
• Weight Watchers PointsPlus®: 1 point

Sugar and Salt Free Version

Per 2 tablespoons / 30 ml

• 10 calories, 3 mg sodium
• Weight Watchers PointsPlus®:  2 to 4 tablespoons: 0 points; 6 tablespoons: 1 point.

* Nutrition info provided by https://caloriecount.about.com

* PointsPlus™ calculated by healthycanning.com. Not endorsed by Weight Watchers® International, Inc, which is the owner of the PointsPlus® registered trademark.

* Better Stevia ® is a registered trademark of the NOW Foods Company.

* Herbamare ® is a registered trademark of the A. Vogel Corporation.