Every year, it seems like there’s a new food fad that the public goes absolutely insane for. We’ve seen everything from bacon to kale to blueberries skyrocket in popularity, seemingly with no explanation. So for whatever reason, the past year has seen an influx in the popularity of everyone’s favorite fermented vegetable—pickles.
Once relegated to the side that comes with a sandwich, the pickle has recently become a star in its own right; restaurants now serve sandwiches on pickles instead of bread, potato chips come in dill pickle flavor, and chain fast food restaurant Sonic Drive-In even released a pickle slush.
This trend works really well for me, because I love—truly love—pickles. Most days, you can open my fridge and find a jar of dill pickles—sometimes chips, sometimes spears, sometimes whole—just waiting to be munched on. My roommates in college would often tease me about my tendency to eat pickles as a midnight snack, and it no longer surprises my friends when I ask for extra pickles on sandwiches or as a side.
Weird? I’ll own that. But delicious and low-fat? Absolutely!
So what could make this recent craze even better for a pickle connoisseur like myself?
Alcohol, specifically the pickleback shot.
The pickleback shot is a simple drink: a shot of the liquor of your choice, followed by a shot of pickle juice. But why would anyone do this? Even to a pickle lover such as myself, this sounded…peculiar.
But it’s not as odd as you might think; in fact, brine has been used as a hangover cure for decades. The electrolytes that accompany the salty juice help replenish your body’s water supply after the dehydrating effects of the alcohol; this can help solve a lot of the most common hangover problems, like headaches, cramps, and even stomachaches. Now, there isn’t a whole lot of science to back this up. Personal anecdotes and cultural traditions make up most of our evidence—but that doesn’t mean there isn’t some grain of truth to it.
In fact, a simple imparting of wisdom is exactly how New York bartender Reggie Cunningham discovered this fascinating combination. Cunningham is credited with inventing the salty shot in 2006, but he’ll tell you that the real genius behind the drink is the old southern woman at the bar that night who saw Cunningham snacking on some pickles and asked for a shot of the juice along with her whiskey.
The original recipe for the pickleback shot that Cunningham made included Old Crow whiskey and juice from McClure’s spicy dill pickles—and that’s still the signature drink at the Brushwick Country Club bar where Cunningham worked—but the most common recipe today is a shot of Jameson whiskey followed by the juice of small-batch dill pickles.
Of course, the recipe has expanded since its initial creation. Picklebacks are now made with all types of alcohol, and you can even vary the type of pickle juice you take with it; a hotel bar in England boasts ten different brine varieties to choose from. One recipe even calls for the shot IN a pickle—instead of juice as a chaser, you just take a bite of the pickle!
As I mentioned earlier, I love pickles—although I don’t normally drink the juice; but as skeptical as I was about the drink, I had to experience it for myself. And what better place to try a pickle-based drink than Chattanooga’s own Pickle Barrel?
Although the original pickleback shot involved whiskey, the expert I spoke with at the Pickle Barrel informed me that picklebacks are best when taken with the liquor of your choice—so that’s exactly what I did. My pickleback included a shot of chilled vodka accompanied by a shot of dill pickle juice, and I have to say…it was amazing.
The pickle brine immediately washed away the bitterness of the vodka, replacing it with the salty flavor that makes pickles so popular and addicting. Because the vodka was chilled, the salt from the brine immediately warmed my tongue, creating a comforting sensation—similar to when you gargle with warm salt water to soothe a sore throat.
The pickleback shot is now my new favorite and if you like pickles even a little bit, you absolutely have to try it. Not only is it delicious, but who knows—maybe you’ll wake up the next morning feeling rested, hydrated, and sans headache
