Sweet Cucumber Relish

This sweet and tangy relish has a subtle hint of bitterness and heat from the addition of celery and mustard seeds.

By
Joshua Bousel
a photo of Joshua Bousel, a Contributing Writer at Serious Eats
Joshua Bousel
Joshua Bousel is a Serious Eats old-timer, having started sharing his passion for grilling and barbecue recipes on the site back in 2008. He continues to develop grilling and barbecue recipes on his own site, The Meatwave, out of his home base of Durham, North Carolina.
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Updated August 19, 2024
Hotdogs topped with sweet cucumber relish

Serious Eats / Diana Chistruga

Why It Works

  • Salting the shredded vegetables and then draining them before you add the other seasoning improves texture and gives you a less watery relish.
  • Mustard and celery seeds add just a hint of bitterness and heat, which offsets the sweetness of the relish.

With Memorial Day in sight, I sat down to make sure every condiment needed for the summer barbecue season was accounted for:

Ketchup, check.
Mustard, check.
Mayo, check.
Barbecue sauce, check.

Thinking I had the standard bases covered, I started to relax, then realized an important omission, relish! Relish comes in a bunch of varieties—just add vinegar, sugar, and salt to any chopped vegetable—but when we're talking standard cookout fare, it's a sweet cucumber relish you usually want.

To make mine, I implemented to a two-step approach to grate then chop cucumbers, onions, and red and green bell peppers in the food processor to achieve a nice, fine texture. The veggies were then salted, let rest, and rinsed. Next they were simmered in a mixture of vinegar, sugar, celery seed, and mustard seed and transferred to a jar for storage.

What you'll get is a sweet, tangy relish with a nice note of celery and a little bitterness from the mustard seed to round it out. I expect this batch to be gone by the end of the weekend.

This recipe was originally published as part of the column "Sauced."

May 2011

This recipe was slightly updated to reduce the salting time and to indicate you can use either the grating blade of a food processor or a box grater.

Recipe Details

Sweet Cucumber Relish Recipe

Prep 10 mins
Cook 20 mins
Active 45 mins
Salting Time 30 mins
Total 60 mins
Serves 20 servings
Makes 2 1/2 cups

Ingredients

  • 3 large cucumbers, washed, seeded, and cut into 4 large chunks

  • 2 medium white onions, quartered

  • 2 medium red bell peppers, seeded

  • 1 large green bell peppers, seeded

  • 2 tablespoons kosher salt

  • 1 cup cider vinegar

  • 3/4 cup sugar

  • 2 teaspoons mustard seed

  • 2 teaspoons celery seed

Directions

  1. Grate the cucumbers using the grating disc of a food processor, or the medium-sized holes of a box grater. Use the steel blade of the food processor to pulse cucumbers until finely chopped. Repeat with onions and both peppers.

    Cucumber finely chopped inside food processor bowl

    Serious Eats / Diana Chistruga

  2. Place chopped cucumbers, onions, and peppers in a medium bowl and mix in salt. Cover and allow to sit for 30 minutes.

    Chopped cucumbers, onions, and peppers mixed in salt inside a medium bowl

    Serious Eats / Diana Chistruga

  3. Pour vegetable mixture out into fine-mesh strainer. Rinse under cold water and strain, pushing the vegetables against the side of the strainer using a rubber spatula to remove as much water as possible.

    Rinsing vegetable mixture in fine mesh strainer under cold water

    Serious Eats / Diana Chistruga

  4. In a medium saucepan, bring vinegar, sugar, mustard seed, and celery seed to a boil over medium high heat, stirring to dissolve to sugar. Add vegetable mixture, reduce heat to medium-low, and simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

    Vinegar, sugar, mustard seed, and celery boiling inside medium saucepan and then reduced to a simmer

    Serious Eats / Diana Chistruga

  5. Let cool to room temperature, transfer relish to an airtight container and store in the refrigerator.

    The finished relish, packed into a jar with a few spoonfuls removed to a white ramekin.

    Serious Eats / Joshua Bousel

Special Equipment

Food processor, box grater (if not using food processor grating blade), fine-mesh strainer, medium saucepan

Read More

Nutrition Facts (per serving)
51Calories
0gFat
12gCarbs
1gProtein
×
Nutrition Facts
Servings: 20
Amount per serving
Calories51
% Daily Value*
Total Fat 0g0%
Saturated Fat 0g0%
Cholesterol 0mg0%
Sodium 191mg8%
Total Carbohydrate 12g4%
Dietary Fiber 1g2%
Total Sugars 10g
Protein 1g
Vitamin C 34mg170%
Calcium 16mg1%
Iron 0mg2%
Potassium 133mg3%
*The % Daily Value (DV) tells you how much a nutrient in a food serving contributes to a daily diet. 2,000 calories a day is used for general nutrition advice.
(Nutrition information is calculated using an ingredient database and should be considered an estimate.)

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