- "The Gherkin" is also a popular name for the 30 St Mary Axe building.
Gherkin is the immature fruit of the cucumber, a vegetable. It is commonly pickled.
It is believed that gherkins were first pickled 4500 years ago in Mesopotamia. Cleopatra thought gherkins made her beautiful. The armies of Julius Caesar and Napoleon were fed gherkins. During World War II, forty percent of the gherkins produced in the US went to the armed forces.
There are as many as 8500 gherkins in a 45-gallon barrel. A midget is an even smaller gherkin (there are up to 30,000 small midgets in a barrel).
Pickles are made in one of three ways:
- Processed pickles are made the old-fashioned way, by a process of fermentation. The bacteria in the cucumber are allowed to reduce the sugars present. This usually takes about five weeks, and the resulting pickles have a shelf life of many months.
- Fresh-packed pickles are made by pasteurizing cucumbers to kill bacteria or make bacterial spores dormant. Fresh-packed pickles have a shelf life of many months. Many commercially-produced pickles are fresh-packed.
- Refrigerated pickles (sometimes called overnight pickles) are made by placing cucumbers in a vinegar solution and refrigerating them. Compared to processed or fresh-pack pickles, refrigerated pickles have a relatively short shelf life, and even unopened jars should be kept refrigerated.
Dill pickles are sour. Kosher pickles are garlic-flavoured dills. Bread and butter pickles are onion-flavored and sweet.
Gherkins are a standard ingredient of piccalilli.
There are many different types of gherkins based on differences in preparation, added ingredients, especially spices, size, and form.
The US market divides them as follows:
- Based on the way gherkins are made, there are processed pickles (also called fermented), fresh-pack pickles, and refrigerated pickles.
- Based on flavourings, there are dill, garlic, sweet, bread and butter, deli and kosher pickles.
- Based on size, there are gerkins and midgets.
- Based on form, there are whole pickles, spears, chips, slices, chunks and stackers.
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