Posted: July 23rd, 2010 - 6:27pm by Ben Chapman

Last year renwoned New York Times food dude Mark Bittman posted a recipe for a botulism surprise (disguised as a garlic-in-oil product) that was ammended after a few letters about safety. Today, one of Bittman's colleagues and contributors to his blog, Kerri Conan writes about a way to make "quick pickles" apparently the wrong way.

According to Conan, to make the skillet pickles:

Start with trimmed whole or sliced vegetables (in this case green beans but I later made a batch with beets) and a hot skillet filmed with olive oil. Add some aromatics (the first garlic from the garden for the first; the other got a mixture of sesame and grape seed oils with scallions). When the seasoning just starts to sputter, toss in the veg. Move them around in the pan a bit so the color brightens evenly, then stir in a splash each of water and vinegar (I used sherry v. for the beans and rice v. for the beets, but your call).

Bring the whole lot to a boil and cook until the vegetables are about two clicks less tender than you eventually want them. Remove the pan from the heat to cool. Empty everything into a jar and chill, shaking the contents often. Polish them off in a few days.

Conan's recipe sounds a bit more like a salad, but included in this post (unlike Mark's last year) is the addition of a refrigeration step for preserving the product, and the mention of eating it within a couple of days. Chilling is a good tip, green beans with the addition of a "splash" of vinegar with a bunch of oil left on the counter for a few days could result in a serious public health issue. The pathogen of concern, Clostridium botulinum, could exist as spores on the suggested ingredients. Heating the foods may activate the spores and placing the flavor-making components into certain oils can create the perfect environment (oxygen-free and low acid) for cell growth and botulinum toxin formation.