Easy Pickled Onions

Name: Easy Pickled Onions | Red Pickled Onions Recipe | Shared Appetit
Prep time: 4 min
Cook time: 2 min
Total time: 6 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: American
Ingredients: 1 medium red onion, thinly sliced; 1/2 cup apple cider vinegar; 1 cup warm water; 1 tablespoon sugar; 1 1/2 teaspoons Kosher salt

By Chris Cockren 36 Comments

Asheley loves pickles. LOVES them. I even got her an “I Love Pickles” t-shirt for Christmas. She wears it with a smile on her face and pride in her heart. You have to try and make these easy pickled onions.

Personally, I’m not a fan of the conventional cucumber pickle. They just don’t do it for me, unless we are talking about those little bread and butter pickle chips. I’ve liked those since I was a little squirt of a kid.

But we’re about to embark upon a completely different story. These easy pickled onions are a precious gift. I cherish them. I adore them. And they are ridiculously easy to make. 5 minutes, a red onion, and you’re done.

A really easy way to pickle onions.

You can add pickled onions to pretty much anything and it will taste better. They add a perfect, tart crunch to sandwiches, burgers, salads, nachos, tacos, and really anything else you can think to add them to.

And it really is as easy as mixing up a quick brine solution and pouring it over a thinly sliced onion. No cooking required.

These easy pickled onions really taste best once they’ve had at least a day to relax and chill out in the brine bath. And they last for a few weeks kept refrigerated.

I always try to have a mason jar full of them in the fridge… you don’t want to be unexpectedly caught pickled-onion-empty-handed. That would just be plain embarrassing.

I attended a pickling seminar this past fall at the NYC Wine and Food Festival, hosted by Iron Chef Geoffrey Zakarian. He mentioned that when he cooks a dish and feels like it’s missing a certain something, 9 times out of 10 he ends up adding some sort of pickled vegetable. The power of the pickle!

Red-onions-ball-jar

Go ahead and use red onions. You won’t achieve this vibrant pink color with any other onions, unless your talking about adding some artificial food dye to your pickled onions. And really, why would you do that?

You’re going to see a bunch of recipes coming up in the next couple of weeks that include these pickled onions. Get ready now and whip up a batch. It will literally take you 5 minutes, unless you are out of red onions and need to go the store. In which case, can you pick me up some milk? I’m out of milk.

I’ll just come out right now and say You’re Welcome, since I’m pretty sure you’ll want to thank me after adding pickled onions to your condiment pantry. What do you like to put pickled onions on?

I found this recipe in one of my recent issues of Bon Appetit...

Here are a few other recipes I have made that feature these easy pickled onions. If you try them out please let me know. We think this is the best best pickled onions recipe. You can also use white onions if you do not have red onions available.

Tips and facts about easy pickled onions

A few tips and facts about these easy pickled onions are. To get rid of onion breath eat some parsley. A really great way to tell if an onion is fresh is by picking it up and feeling if it is squishy. If the skin is also slimy or has a odd smell pick a different one. Your onions will stay fresh in a cool dark place for up to 2 or 3 months. Also the biggest onion ever grown was over 10 pounds. Homemade pickled onions last about 2 – 4 weeks refrigerated.

Recipes that use Pickled Onions