Indulge me....
My favorite steak house is rather unique. Once you get a table, and are seated, there are buckets of pickled items for you to nosh on while waiting for the first round of drinks. There normally is a bucket of these wonderful dill pickles, a bucket of fresh sour kraut and green tomatoes, but best of all there is normally a bucket of pickled hot cherry peppers which are hot, but not too hot.
The customers at this steak house all really come for the some thing, their famous 24 ounce Delmonico steak. Each steak comes with a side of home fries and, most importantly, one of those same pickled cherry peppers.
I am in love with those peppers. You take a little cut of the pepper, then a cut of the steak on the same fork for an explosion of flavor. This is one of my most favorite things to eat.
Since I like to grill at home, I decided that I need to be able to can my own. Thanks to a past member here, I got a recipe that is a spot on match and have been canning them for several years now.
Each cookout, I bring out a jar. They are great with steak, but place on a burger (rip out the stem and seeds, and squash it flat) and you are in for a really big treat.
Two years ago, I had a group of nieces and nephews over for a cook out. I was sitting next to my littlest niece, Irena who is a tiny little thing that just turned 20. I saw her go to eat one of the peppers straight from the jar.
Before she could bite down on it, I warned her. I said "be careful, those are hot and I do not think a young gal like you could take it".
OK, Not the greatest way to issue a warning. Instead of heeding to what I said, she became determined to show me how tough she was.
As I looked her in the face, she ate the pepper. I continue to stare into her face and, to her credit, she offered no reaction to the pain she must have been experiencing. After about 30 second, I noticed a tear was running down her cheek.
Long story short, from that day forward, the peppers were called "Russian Tears" (my Niece is Russian).
Russian Tears are immensely popular in my family. The problem is that you need a full pound of those peppers for each jar and they are very hard to find.
Enter the farm stand across the street. They were able to get a whole box of them for me (about 15 pounds) all for $22.00!
Russian Tears for everybody!!!
Last night I did my first dozen jars..