Lemon white pickle / Limbe bili uppinakayi

Lemon pickle prepared using just lemon, salt and green chillies (preferably jeerige meanasu / sooji menasu or gandhari means) is one of my favourite pickle which Amma prepares. It tastes so good when farm fresh lemons are used. If you have sooji menasu, use that. If not, you can use normal green chillies.

Ingredients

Lemon - 6
Salt - 1/4 cup
Green chillies - 20 to 25
Water - 4 cups

Method

Wash the lemons and green chillies and dry them using cloth.

Chop the lemon in to small pieces. Remove seeds and inner hard lined portion. Slit the green chillies vertically and then chop them into medium sized pieces.

Heat 4 cups of water in a thick vessel. Add 1/4 cup of salt and bring to boil til water becomes almost 1 cup. Add chopped lemon and green chilies and boil for 2 minutes.

Switch off the stove and allow it to cool down. You may feel pickle is little watery. Do not worry, after fermenting, it thickens.

Store it a glass container and allow it to ferment for over 2 weeks.

Optionally you can add tempering of oil and asafetida. I like the smell of lemon itself. So I do not add tempering.

This pickle can be used without refrigerating for over 2 months. With refrigerating, can use even more time.