Watermelons are a delicacy that many people love. But their season is not that long, so the question arises of how to save them for the winter. Salted watermelon in a jar is the best solution. Even a novice hostess can prepare them. And the result is a great snack and even a table decoration. Consider several cooking options, from which you can choose any to your liking.

The easiest recipe

Canned salted watermelons can be prepared with a minimum of ingredients. You need to take watermelons, water and salt. Unripe berries are suitable for salting (even slightly brown ones). It is better if these are small diameter watermelons. They must be rinsed with water (cold) and cut off the circles from the side of the tails. We pre-prepare the jars by sterilizing them over steam. Cut watermelons into circles about 15 millimeters thick. Then we cut each circle into four parts so that each piece fits into the jar. After that, put the watermelons in jars and fill them with boiling water.

This must be done carefully so that the container does not burst. Cover the jars with lids and leave for 10 minutes. Next, drain the water and fill the jars with boiling water again. We leave them again for 10 minutes. In the meantime, prepare the brine. We put a pot of water on the fire and put 30 grams of salt for each liter. One three-liter jar will need 1 liter of brine. Let the brine boil for about 10 minutes and filter it through cheesecloth. After that, put the pan on the fire and bring it to a boil again. Add 15 milliliters of vinegar for each liter. If the watermelons are not ripe, then put another 20 grams of sugar per liter of water. Fill the jars with cooked boiling brine and roll them up tightly. Cool and store in a cool place. Salted watermelon (in a jar) will be appreciated by lovers of delicious food. If suddenly the lids begin to swell, you need to drain the brine, boil it and pour it back.

Add spices

If you add a few spicy ingredients, then salted watermelons will get an extraordinary taste. For this recipe, you will need celery and dill greens, garlic and salad peppers. For the brine, take 30 grams of salt and 50 grams of sugar for each liter of water. We take watermelons suitable for salting (brown, ripe, but not overripe). We wash them thoroughly and cut them into four parts. Then we cut each part into slices that can fit into the neck of the jar. Grind the celery and dill, and cut the pepper into medium-sized slices. Divide the garlic into cloves and peel. We wash and sterilize the jars. To get a delicious salted watermelon in a jar, all conditions must be met. Put herbs, peppers and garlic at the bottom of each container. After that, lay out a layer of watermelons. So fill the cans layer by layer. Fill them with brine and leave them at room temperature. Then we send to a cooler place. We close the jars with plastic lids. Salted watermelon in a jar turns out to be very tasty. But other containers can be used as well. The technology does not change from this. Large pots or barrels are often used. Small watermelons can be salted in them without cutting into pieces.

Foreword

Previously, only large tubs were used for long-term storage, however, today salting watermelons in a wooden barrel is considered the most productive, allowing you to prepare a large harvest for the winter.

Large-volume containers for various preservation are made from a wide variety of materials. Moreover, there are even jugs made of thick bottle glass or enameled steel. But more often than not, food is harvested in large barrels. Today on the market there is a large selection of containers of this kind, made of plastic, stainless steel or wood.

It should be noted that polymer tanks are not very good for conservation, because today recycling of plastic waste is often used on an industrial scale. And in general, this material can give a rather specific taste or smell to any preservation. But when choosing a high-quality container, it can serve for a long time. Stainless steel barrels are almost everlasting. Moreover, such an alloy of metals practically does not oxidize, and therefore does not impair the taste of the blanks, in contrast to conventional iron tanks. It is from this material that all cutting tables, pipes, trays, tanks and boilers in the food industry are often made. However, stainless steel containers are expensive and that is why they are rarely used at home.

Plastic and steel barrels

The best option is classic wooden barrels. They are more expensive than plastic ones, but much cheaper than metal ones. Their advantage lies in the environmental friendliness of the material, as well as in some additional properties that depend on the type of wood. If you want your food to last as long as possible, it is best to choose oak containers, as such wood contains very large amounts of tannin, which is a tannin... This natural material is released from the walls of the barrel very slowly, due to which the shelf life of watermelons can be very long, but their taste will change slightly over time.

In linden barrels, on the other hand, all the qualities of the workpiece will remain unchanged. In addition, the likelihood of fermentation of the product will significantly decrease, thanks to the antiseptic substances contained in the wood of this species - they suppress the activity of bacteria. In no case should you purchase a barrel with a burnt surface inside for preparing pickles, this option is only suitable for aging home wines for several years.

It is enough to wash steel and plastic containers thoroughly, and, preferably, without chemical detergents. After washing, thoroughly rinse the barrels under running water, and then dry, being careful not to get dust inside (you can cover the necks with gauze). You will have to tinker with wooden containers made of linden: as a rule, if they are new, there is almost certainly a lot of sawdust inside in barely noticeable cracks and cracks. Therefore, it is necessary to thoroughly rinse such a barrel several times until the poured water no longer smells of fresh wood.

Wooden barrel for salting

Oak barrels take even longer to prepare. The fact is that initially the tannin content on the inner surface and in the lower layers of the wood is too high. If you start salting right away, the workpiece will acquire a very astringent taste, very different from the natural one. Therefore, it is preliminarily recommended to pour water into the barrel for a month, while it is advisable to empty and refill the container every 2 days. When the drained liquid is clean, odorless of wood, you can proceed to the next stage. Prepare boiling water and pour it into a barrel, filling it by about a third, add soda, in a proportion of 2 grams for each liter, then tilt the container so that the solution rinses the inner surface to the very edge. Drain and rinse again with clean boiling water.

If you bought a barrel a long time ago, and have not been used for a long time, the sequence of actions should be almost the same. In particular, you need to fill the container with water for a month, from time to time replacing it with a clean one. This is necessary in order to eliminate the consequences of the drying out of the wood, it must be saturated with moisture and swell. In addition, in case if mold suddenly appears in the barrel, it is useful to rinse the walls with saline solution. And, most importantly, just before laying the food, be sure to fumigate the inner surfaces with sulfur, so you will avoid the appearance of fungus in the workpieces.

You should choose late varieties, such as Spring, Kustovoy 334 or Icarus. All of them are quite suitable for pickling or pickling. But, first of all, you should choose the right fruit. They shouldn't be too ripe, and if they turn out to be a little unripe, it's even better. The main thing is that the watermelons have juicy pink flesh and there are no defects on the peel (try to choose those that do not have darkened or soft areas). Preference should be given to fruits weighing less than 2 kilos.

Salting watermelons

Small berries are also very good for harvesting for future use, if they have already managed to gain sweetness. In particular, many gardeners use small fruits for salting, even early ripening ones, for example, such as Sugar Baby. The main factor when choosing a variety is a thin skin. It is also desirable that the pulp is not too crumbly. The content of juice in melons and gourds also plays a significant role, it must be high enough to make the harvest tasty.

So, you have selected melons, the barrel is prepared, it remains only to prepare the brine. To do this, based on the volume of the container (and taking into account that part of it will be occupied by watermelons), we take 1 kilo of salt for every 10 liters of water and prepare a strong solution. If the fruit is less than 15 centimeters in diameter, 800 grams of salt will suffice. Now you need to thoroughly wash the watermelons and cut off their tails at the very base. Next, take a long wooden knitting needle or a kebab skewer, and make a dozen punctures, evenly distributing them along the "equator" of each fruit. This is necessary in order for the brine to quickly penetrate under the peel and soak the pulp.

Salting barrel watermelons

In no case should salt be iodized, otherwise it can greatly spoil the taste and even the color of the workpiece. We roll the inner surfaces of the barrel with boiling water, in case fungal spores or microorganisms managed to get inside, due to which the product may start to sour. It is better to repeat this procedure 2-3 times. Then we carefully put the watermelons in the barrel, in even rows, not too tightly so that they do not crush each other. It is advisable to fill the container at least 2 thirds full. Now we fill in the brine so that it covers the top row of melons by a few centimeters. If the fruits begin to float, it's okay, to solve the problem it is enough to have a wooden circle with a diameter slightly less than the neck at hand. We put it on the watermelons and put some kind of load on top, not too heavy, so as not to damage the workpiece.

Now you need to wait at least a day, and preferably 48 hours, leaving the workpiece at room temperature. During this time, the brine will have time to mix with the watermelon juice, which will flow out through the holes in the skin. In addition, some of the solution will get inside the berries. However, small fruits will have time to go through the first stage of soaking in 12 hours. Further, if part of the brine has evaporated or flowed out through small cracks, add the required amount of fresh brine, cover the barrel with double-folded gauze and transfer it to the cellar. In a cool place, the salting process will slow down and the product will be ready in about 21-22 days. Further storage requires regular topping up of the brine as it decreases from the container.

This option will allow you to get completely whole fruits, under the skin of which weak fermentation processes will take place, that is, the pulp will become, in a sense, carbonated. So, wash all the melons and gourds, and also cut the stalks from them. This time you do not need to pierce the peel, but a layer of washed and calcined river sand, 7 centimeters thick, should be poured onto the bottom of the scalded barrel.

Preparing melons for salting in the sand

We put the first row of fruits on top, not too tightly, but without leaving large gaps. Then pour the sand again, covering the watermelons by 2-3 centimeters, and lay the second row of berries. They should also be covered with a layer of sand. We make a brine by dissolving 800 grams of salt and 200-400 grams of sugar in every 10 liters of water (to your liking). The proportion of watermelons and pouring liquid should be 2: 1.

Now we pour the resulting moderately strong solution into the container, trying not to wash out the upper sand layer - the workpiece should be completely hidden under it. As a result, you will not need any bending or a cover. We leave the watermelons in this form for 3 days at room temperature, so that the fermentation process begins inside, under the skin. Then we move the barrel to the cellar, and the temperature in which our ambassador should be for the winter should not exceed 3 degrees Celsius.

Another recipe for harvesting watermelons for the winter is suitable for those who want to preserve the sweetness of these juicy berries. Moreover, this time we will not use the brine at all. We take 1.5 times more fruit than is necessary for placing them in a barrel in several rows. We wash half of them and get rid of the stalks, and cut the remaining ones and clean the flesh out of them in small pieces, pouring out the juice that stands out into a separate bowl.

Salty and sweet watermelon canning

We put the first row of watermelons in the scalded barrel, and in the gaps between them and along the wall we pour the crushed core mixed with salt (it needs about 5-6% of the total mass of berries). Thus, we lay the next rows, covering the uppermost with pulp for a few centimeters. The barrel must be filled to the top. When the container is full, close it tightly with a wooden lid, in which there should be a hole with a stopper. Pour juice through this hole, seal it well and leave it warm for 4–5 days so that the workpiece ferments. For uniformity of the process inside, you can tilt and turn the barrel from side to side several times within a specified period.

Then the preservation can simply be laid and rolled back to the cellar, lowered into it and left until use. Such an ambassador can be stored for up to six months at a temperature not exceeding 3 degrees Celsius. According to this recipe, you can cook differently - the pulp of watermelons can be easily replaced with chopped, which is placed on the bottom and along the walls, as well as on top of each layer. The only difference is that gauze is put on top, which is pressed down with a wooden circle and oppression.

It is better to start the ambassador in the fall, so that watermelons do not sour in the heat, the optimal time is the end of September or mid-October. During this period, almost all late varieties ripen, and you can choose suitable berries. In addition to salt, you can add various seasonings if you want an unusual spicy snack. In particular, it is allowed to put allspice peas, celery root or herbs, chopped ginger, coriander and, of course, horseradish into such a blank.

Salted watermelon

But if you want to get the natural taste of watermelon, it is better to refrain from adding spices and limit yourself to salt and sugar. As additional ingredients, apples or tomatoes can be salted with watermelons. The next thing to remember is that the fermentation process should take place only at the first stage, at room temperature. The product should not ferment in a cold cellar, otherwise it will very quickly become inedible. Therefore, the lid should be closed tightly, but from time to time it is recommended to check the conservation and top up with fresh brine if necessary.

In addition, in order to avoid the appearance of mold on the bottom of the barrel, it must be placed on a wooden lattice laid on a layer of dry sand. You can also add straw. You also need to make sure that mold does not appear on the surface of the brine, in this case it must be carefully removed, the wooden circle should be washed and fresh brine added. If the barrel is new, the salt for pouring will need 10-15% more than indicated in the recipe - some of it will be absorbed by the wood.

Salted watermelons are a dish with a unique taste that is very difficult to describe: it contains a little of wine, a little of kvass, and a little of brine. If you serve a salted watermelon cut into pieces, it replaces a savory snack. If you squeeze the juice out of the pulp, you get an original drink. Housewives who have never cooked salted watermelons for the winter in jars should try to make this unusual snack at least once.

Cooking features

Salted watermelons are an unusual snack, and the technology of its preparation has its own characteristics.

• For pickling in jars, medium-sized berries weighing about 2-3 kilograms are suitable, otherwise their pieces may not enter the jar. Preference should be given to thin-skinned ones, unless you intend to salt them without the peel. The skin must not be damaged.
• Ripe, but not overripe, watermelons should be chosen for salting, since the latter turn out to be loose and tasteless.
• Before salting, you will have to not only wash the watermelon well and peel it, if technology requires it, from the peel, but also remove all the seeds. If left, canned food will explode. The peel can not be thrown away, but used to make unusual jam.
• A watermelon weighing about 2.5 kilograms takes from 1.5 to 2.5 liters of brine, depending on the size of the pieces into which it is cut: the larger the watermelon slices, the more liquid will go away. The exact amount of brine is determined as follows: the berry is placed in jars, poured with water, after which the water is poured into a saucepan, its volume is measured. In recipes, the number of components is usually calculated per liter of water; when preparing it, it must be increased in proportion to the volume of liquid drained from cans.
• When salting, the watermelon pulp should ferment a little, otherwise the ready-made canned food will not have the taste characteristic of salted watermelons.

To give salted watermelons the desired taste, aroma, you can use a variety of spices and spices: garlic (up to 3 cloves per three-liter jar), onions (no more than one onion), horseradish root and ginger (1 cm), dill and celery (5 branches per 1.5-2.5 liters of brine), cherry leaves, currants, laurel (2-3 leaves), coriander, allspice and black pepper (3-4 peas). When choosing spices, you can rely on your taste, but you definitely need to know when to stop, adding from 3 to 5 components listed above. The amount of salt and sugar should correspond to the selected recipe.

Salted watermelons - a simple recipe with sterilization

• watermelon - 2 kg;
• brine water - 1 l;
• sugar - 60 g;
• salt - 20 g;
• garlic - 3 cloves;
• dill - 5 branches;
• currant leaves - 2 pcs.;
• cherry leaves - 2 pcs.

Cooking method:

• Wash the watermelon, cut into small pieces, and peel them off.
• Sterilize, dry a 3 liter jar.
• Gently place the watermelon pulp in it so as not to crease.
• Pouring water into a saucepan, dissolve salt, sugar in it, add the spices indicated in the recipe or replace with those that you prefer.
• Bring the brine to a boil, cool to room temperature.
• Pour watermelons in a jar, tie a neck with a thin cloth, put in a dark but warm place for two days.
• Place a cloth in a large saucepan, pour in water. Without pouring the brine from the jar, place it in the saucepan. Bring water in a saucepan to a boil over low heat. Sterilize the jar of watermelon chunks for half an hour.
• Remove the can from the pot. Roll up the metal lid. Wrap with a towel.
• After 6 hours, unwind the towel, put the salted watermelons in a cool room, where they will stand until winter.

Opening a jar of salted watermelons in winter, you can enjoy their amazing taste, vaguely reminiscent of the taste of salted tomatoes. This appetizer is ready for use in a week.

Salted watermelons with honey - recipe without sterilization

• watermelon - 2 kg;
• honey - 100 g;
• sugar - 20 g;
• salt - 20 g;
• water - 1 l;
• ginger root (peeled) - 1 cm;
• cherry leaves - 3 pcs.;
• currant leaves - 3 pcs.

Cooking method:

• Wash the watermelon well and cut into triangular (cone-shaped) pieces right with the rind.
• Sterilize the jar.
• Melt the honey to a liquid state and coat the inside of the jar with it. The layer should not be too thin, use all the honey.
• Place a piece of ginger root at the bottom of the jar, over a leaf of currant and cherry.
• Stack the watermelon by half filling the jar with it.
• Put on a leaf of cherries, currants.
• Fill the jar with the remaining berry pieces.
• Place the remaining spicy leaves on top.
• Boil water with salt and sugar.
• When the brine has cooled, pour it into the jar.
• Tie the jar's throat with gauze.
• Place the watermelons in a dark place where they will sour for three days.
• Drain the brine from the jar into a saucepan, boil for a couple of minutes and pour back hot.
• Roll up the jar with a metal lid.

You can try watermelons salted for the winter with honey in a month. With their zesty spicy flavor, they are a bit like ginger ale.

Taking any of the above recipes as a basis, combining spices and spices, you can get snacks for the winter with a variety of tastes.

Those wishing to learn how to marinate watermelons should consider several popular recipes with photos and choose a decent one. The soft flesh of the watermelon allows it to freely absorb all the components next to it.

The usefulness of watermelon

Brightly saturated is not only a sweet and tasty fruit, it is also very useful. Before pickling watermelons, you must first familiarize yourself with its positive properties.

Firstly, watermelon is saturated with folic acid, which affects blood formation, as well as the regulation of all chemical processes in the body. It is watermelon that is famous for its abundance of folic acid more than all other vegetables or fruits.

Secondly, the iron in the red fruit makes up for the lack of it in the body and treats anemia.

Thirdly, beneficial trace elements have a beneficial effect on people with diabetes.

Fourth, the fiber contained inside the watermelon removes cholesterol.

Fifth, vitamins B1, B2, C, PP, fructose, carotene and other positive substances are found in the berry in question.

Since August, we begin to enjoy the sweet watermelon taste, but everyone knows perfectly well that the fruit does not grow all year round. Therefore, you need to make pickled watermelons in jars for the winter. During storage, some of the nutrients will, of course, disappear, but the main one will remain. Canning is an easy process that takes up to an hour. In addition, such provisions are quite cheap. It does not require additional expensive ingredients, just a watermelon from the garden, vinegar, salt and sugar. Jars for canning are selected of any volume, starting from the number of family members.

Pickled watermelons with sterilization

To cook delicious pickled watermelons in jars for the winter, you need to take 2 kilograms of watermelons. The result of the finished food will have a salty taste. Among the components for the marinade will be a liter of water, 3 tbsp. tablespoons of sugar and 1.5 tbsp. tablespoons of salt. To store the preservation, citric acid is needed, for this amount of ingredients you need 1 teaspoon with a slide.

Cooking process:

1 teaspoon of citric acid is substituted with 9% vinegar, in the amount of 50 grams.

Pickled watermelons without sterilization

To marinate a watermelon quickly, you need to exclude the sterilization procedure, but then you should strictly follow all the above cooking steps. Pickled watermelons without sterilization get a sweet and sour taste. For the recipe, you need 10 kg of watermelons with peels. They should fit into 6 liter jars, so they should be sterilized beforehand. For brine, for each can, prepare 0.7 liters of ordinary tap water and 1 tbsp. spoonful of salt, sugar and vinegar.

Cooking process:

Add nutmeg, cloves, or other spices if desired.

Pickled watermelons with aspirin

To prepare pickled watermelons with aspirin, you need to sterilize a 3-liter jar and wash 2 kilograms of watermelons. The brine will require 1 tbsp. spoon of salt, 2 tbsp. tablespoons of sugar, 2 aspirin tablets - all this will dissolve in 1 liter of water. Allspice and black peppercorns can be used as spices.

Cooking process:

You can not get rid of watermelon seeds. They give an aesthetic appearance and do not interfere with storage at all.

Pickled watermelons with citric acid

To get pickled watermelons with citric acid, you need to prepare 2 kilograms of watermelons. For the marinade, 1 liter of water is needed, in which 1 tbsp will be diluted. spoon of salt, 2 tbsp. tablespoons of sugar and half a teaspoon of citric acid. The aroma will give black peppercorns, the amount of which is taken to taste.

Cooking process:

Pickled watermelon with garlic

For those looking for an unusual flavor, there is a step-by-step recipe with pictures of pickled watermelons with garlic. The finished dish has garlic bitterness and a salty taste. For harvesting, you should wash 1.5-2 kilograms of fruit. Peel a clove of garlic. For the marinade, you need 50 grams of salt, 80 grams of sugar and the same amount of vinegar.

Cooking process:

The above were considered the most popular recipes for marinating watermelons for the winter. There are many canning options for this fruit, but they are all based on the usual standard cooking steps provided in these lists. Many hostesses fantasize on their own and add their own spices to taste, departing from the recipe. The result changes for the better according to taste, the main thing is not to overdo it. Delicious winter preparations for you!

Video recipe for pickled watermelons with heavenly apples

Wash the watermelon well.

Wash the jars and sterilize. I usually sterilize jars like this: I pour water into the pan, put a special circle on top for sterilization and send the pan to the fire, when the water boils, put the jar on the circle with the neck down so that the jar does not touch the boiling water, reduce the heat to a minimum and sterilize the jar over steam within 3-5 minutes.

In a separate saucepan, boil the lids: in a saucepan of boiling water, place the seaming lids (do not forget to check that there is an elastic band in the lids) so that they are completely covered with water, simmer for 2-3 minutes over low heat. If you will not immediately fill sterilized jars, then cover them with a boiled lid.
Cut the watermelon into slices. The peel, if desired, can not be peeled, I always close it with it. The pieces should be such that they fit easily into the jar. I usually cut the watermelon into 4 pieces and then cut the watermelon into triangles.

Boil water and pour the jar of watermelon to the very top, cover with a lid, wrap with a towel. In this position, jars of watermelons must be kept for 40 minutes.

Calculate the volume of the water that was in the jar (we will no longer need this water). Take the same amount of pure water as was in the jar of watermelons, and boil along with sugar and salt, boil for a few minutes until the crystals of sugar and salt are completely dissolved. It is clean water that is taken, because the watermelon could be processed, so we will save our harvest. Approximately 2 liters of marinade is used for a three-liter jar. Pour 50 ml of 9% vinegar into each three-liter jar of watermelons, then pour the marinade to the very top so that the water flows over the edge. Cover the jar with a lid and roll up. Turn the jar upside down, wrap it up for two days.

Jars of watermelons marinated for the winter according to this recipe are perfectly stored both in the apartment and in the cellar, it's checked!