Sweet, slightly sour, super crunchy with condensed cucumber flavor, almost like a candy. This sweet and sour cucumber is really simple and easy to make. It’s not a pickle but will last in the fridge for 2 weeks. It probably won’t though, it’s super tasty you’ll eat it up within a day! Great as a side served with fried food to cut the grease.

It’s summer, it’s all about refreshing, crunchy sweet, sour things… and CUKES! If you’ve been following me on Instagram, you might have seen how crazy our garden has become, and our three cucumber plants have produced over 110 cucumbers to date! (more to come) I’ve been experimenting with all sorts of cucumber recipes and making cucumber and sesame salad for dinner almost every night, and I still feel like we don’t eat them fast enough.

I’ve made dill pickles, fermented pickles, cucumber kimchi, and soy and vinegar pickles… but I still have a lot of cucumbers left! So, brace yourself, tons of cukes recipe coming your way!

Cucumbers

The cucumber I’m using is called “Suyo Long”, it was the closest thing I could find that resembles a Taiwanese cucumber when we were looking for seeds to grow. They are long, skinny, dark green and prickly, but the skin is not as tough as a pickling cucumber or the big fat ones you’d find at a supermarket. In Taiwan, the prickliness is actually how you could tell whether the cucumber is fresh!

This cucumber is very sweet and super crispy, makes amazing salads and slicing cucumbers. We enjoy it best fresh, but with the plants producing 50 cukes in a week, I had to pickle some!

Dishes to Serve with the Sweet and Sour Cucumbers

My most memorable memory of this sweet and sour cucumber was at Keelung night market, one of the most famous night markets in Taiwan. They are famous for this deep fried fish cake “Tempura”(天婦羅, tian1fu4luo2), drenched in a tangy sauce and a side of this sweet and sour cukes. These cucumbers were my favorite part of the dish, it balanced out the greasiness and fishiness of the tempura perfectly. But let’s be honest, sweet and sour anything is always going to be my favorite in hot, tropical weather.

This can be served with anything you’re eating, but I like it with anything heavier, as I said, it’s super refreshing and cuts the grease! I’ve had sandwiches with these inside, braised pork rice with cukes on the side and so much more! Try it and experiment with it.

I WOULD LOVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU THINK OF THIS RECIPE, RATE + COMMENT BELOW OR #CHEWEXPERIMENT ON INSTAGRAM!!!

Sweet and Sour Cucumber

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Sweet, slightly sour, super crunchy with condensed cucumber flavor, this is exactly what this sweet and sour cucumber is. Really simple and easy to make. It's not really a pickle but will last in the fridge for 2 weeks.

Course Appetizer, Salad, Side Dish

Cuisine Taiwanese, Vegetarian

Keyword Cucumber, Salad, Side Dish

Prep Time 5 minutes minutes

Resting Time 10 minutes minutes

Total Time 5 minutes minutes

Servings 1 Pint

Author Choochoo-ca-Chew

Ingredients

• 3 Medium Suyo Long Cucumbers replace with English cucumbers or other skinny slicing cukes
• 1 tsp Salt
• 2-1/2 TBsp Sugar
• 2 TBsp Rice Vinegar or white wine vinegar/ apple cider vinegar

Instructions

• Clean and slice the cucumbers into 3mm rounds
• Add 1tsp of salt and mix well, let sit for 10 minutes
• Drain and squeeze out as much moisture as you can (This step makes the cucumbers super crunchy and condenses the flavor)

  The cucumbers should look much smaller and almost wrinkly.
• Move the cucumbers into a pint jar, add 2TBsp of sugar and 2 TBsp of vinegar, shake around to mix and keep in the fridge for 2 hours before serving

OTHER CUCUMBER RECIPES YOU MIGHT LIKE:

TAIWANESE SOY AND VINEGAR PICKLED CUCUMBER | 臺式醬瓜

CUCUMBER SALAD WITH SESAME DRESSING | 麻醬涼拌小黃瓜

TAIWANESE GOLDEN KIMCHI | 台式黃金泡菜