Achar

Achar was one of the last Chinese New Year items to be made, after the cookies and before the cakes. To make the pickles, my mother bought sacks of cucumbers, carrots and cauliflower, in addition to bags of spices and bottles of vinegar. It was a major endeavour as she would selflessly stand for hours to chop the vegetables into the perfect-sized crudités, not trusting many of us around her to cut them into the same shape or size. A bottle of her famous pickled achar, along with a se