5 O’Clock Fridays: Fancy A$$ Pickleback Shots with Eden Grinshpan

Pickles taste pretty dank next to a Jewish deli sandwich, but you haven’t lived until you’ve taken a pickleback shot: a shot of whiskey chased by straight up pickle juice. All that salt and flavor mask the burn of the whiskey, and pickle juice is a damn good hangover cure.

So with my always-alcoholic mind, I thought it’d be dope to pickle some random veggies and use that innovative pickle juice as a chaser with various types of hard liquor. But I couldn’t do this alone. I called my girl Eden Grinshpan — TV personality, blogger, and foodstagram star — to help me out with this one.

It turned out to be a turned up time, to say the least, and the dranks turned out real good. I pickled ’em using my grandma’s method, but if you want to pickle like a Le Cordon Bleu graduate (aka Eden’s way), check out her method on her blog. (Look how legit hers looks… accawkward.)

Photo courtesy of edeneats.com

Pineapple & Ginger + Rum

• Prep Time:10 minutes
• Cook Time:24 hours
• Total Time:24 hours+
• Servings:4
• Easy

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup pineapple, cut
• 1/2 cup ginger, skinned and cut
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 head garlic, with skin (option)
• Salt
• Rum

• Step 1

  Fill up your mason jar halfway with some H2O.

  

• Step 2

  Drop in an uncooked egg and let it sink. Add in enough salt until it floats. Then take that egg out, duh.

  #SpoonTip: This will make it real salty. If you plan to pickle these for more than 24 hours, don’t bother with the egg trick and shoot for 1-2 tablespoons of salt.

• Step 3

  Cut up some pineapple and toss it in there.

• Step 4

  Skin your ginger. Chop it up. Throw it in.

  

• Step 5

  Throw in garlic if you’d like. Eden doesn’t recommend it, but whateva, yolo.

  #SpoonTip: Make sure the water covers all the ingredients.

  

• Step 6

  Jar that puppy up and let it sit overnight.

  #SpoonTip: To help this ish pickle faster, put it next to a window where there’s plenty of sunlight.

  

• Step 7

  Strain out some of the pickle juice. Throw back a shot of rum and chase with dat pickled drank.

  #SpoonTip: It might smell like hot fart, but it doesn’t taste like it.

Red Pepper & Jalapeño + Tequila

• Step 1

  Same drill as above. Before jarring, pour in some peppercorns.

  #SpoonTip: Cut the pepper like Eden. She’s a pro.

  

• Step 2

  24 hours later, take a shot of tequila and chase with this spicy, garlicky sip of Mexico.

Apples + Fireball

• Prep Time:10 minutes
• Cook Time:24 hours
• Total Time:24 hours+
• Servings:4
• Easy

Ingredients

• 1 apple, sliced
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 head garlic, with skin (optional)
• 2 tablespoon vinegar
• Salt
• Fireball Whisky

• Step 1

  You know what to do.

• Step 2

  After a 24-hour dance break, take a shot of Fireball and wash it down with some pickled apple juice. That don’t taste like your recess days, tho.

Coleslaw + Tomato Juice & Vodka

• Prep Time:5 minutes
• Cook Time:24 hours
• Total Time:24 hours+
• Servings:4
• Easy

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup coleslaw, shredded
• 1/2 cup water
• 2 tablespoon vinegar
• 1/4 head garlic, with skin
• Salt
• Peppercorns
• Tomato juice
• Vodka

• Step 1

  Throw all of your ingredients into a jar like you have 3x already.

  #SpoonTip: Pickled coleslaw ≠ kimchi.

• Step 2

  Strain some of that juice into a cup and add some tomato juice. Take a shot of vodka and wash it down with this deconstructed coleslaw Bloody Mary.

Lemon + Gin

• Prep Time:5 minutes
• Cook Time:24 hours
• Total Time:24 hours+
• Servings:4
• Easy

Ingredients

• 1 lemon, quartered
• 1/2 cup water
• 1/4 head garlic, with skin (optional)
• Chili pepper flakes
• Salt
• Gin

• Step 1

  Like, you get it by now.

• Step 2

  Chase a shot of gin with this lemon chili pickle juice. Hell. Yes.