Pickled Black Shimeji Mushrooms 2-Pack

Twenty-four days, and the first of them are the reason this jar tastes the way it does. The batch gets a brief warm-room start before it goes cool, which pushes the early fermentation along and builds a deeper, rounder base than a straight cold ferment reaches.

Three days longer than our white shimeji, which is the same mushroom in a different colour and a much lighter jar. Durations here are set by tasting, matched to each mushroom and the profile we want from it. After fermenting, the sealed jar rests about a month before release — the ferment makes the acidity, the rest settles it in.

Filtered water, apple cider vinegar, garlic, dill, toasted coriander, bay leaf and sea salt.

Apple cider vinegar is rounder and slightly sweeter than the white wine vinegar in our lighter jars, and a darker-capped shimeji can carry it. Coriander seed is toasted before it goes in, which turns it warm and citrusy instead of raw and soapy — it is the note most people cannot place on first taste. Bay works underneath the whole thing rather than on top of it. The dill carries over from the white shimeji and is the one thread running between the two jars.

Think of this as the white shimeji's louder sibling. Same cluster, same tender bite, considerably more going on around it. If white shimeji is the jar that disappears into a dish, this is the one you notice.

It sits in the middle of our range. Lighter and more aromatic than shiitake, which goes savoury and almost meaty over 28 days with tamari. Less rich than king oyster and its truffle oil. More interesting, if less familiar, than crimini.

Straight from the jar is the shortest route, and the coriander makes these good on their own with a drink in a way the lighter jars are not.

They stand up to strong cheese — aged cheddar, something washed-rind — where a more delicate pickle would vanish. Good with cured meat for the same reason. In a warm grain bowl, farro or barley, they behave more like a condiment than a vegetable. And they are the jar we would reach for alongside roast chicken or pork, where you want acid but not a light one.

Every jar is 480g net, 250g drained, and keeps sealed in a cupboard for twelve months. Once it is open it lives in the fridge and is best inside four weeks — though the brine keeps working the whole time, so the last forkful is a little sharper than the first. That is fermentation doing what it does, not the jar going over.