Main Page
Homemade preparations
Simple squash caviar in a slow cooker for winter

Simple Zucchini Caviar in a Slow Cooker for Winter

A favorite vibrant appetizer for any table! Zucchini caviar made in a slow cooker turns out not just delicious but good for you, too. This caviar is quick and easy to make: there's nothing to stir, it never burns, and it never boils over!

Natalia Tsybulskaya

Recipe author

Simple squash caviar in a slow cooker for winter

Composition / ingredients

Servings:

Zucchini

1.5

Carrots

500

Onion

500

Vegetable oil

100

Garlic

Vinegar

Salt

Sugar

Ground black pepper

Translation table of volumetric measures

Nutrients and energy value of the composition of the recipe

By weight of the composition:

Proteins 8 % 1 g

Fats 33 % 4 g

Carbohydrates 58 % 7 g

61 kcal

GI: 100 / 0 / 0

Cooking method

Step 1:

How do you make zucchini caviar in a slow cooker? Prepare all the ingredients. Any zucchini works for the caviar: white, yellow, or green. Just try to use young zucchini, with thin skin and small seeds.
Step 2:

Peel the onion and cut it into cubes.
Step 3:

Peel the carrots and grate them.
Step 4:

Put the onion and carrots in the slow cooker bowl, set it to the Fry mode, add the vegetable oil, and cook for 15 minutes.
Step 5:

Add the garlic. I pressed the cloves through a garlic press, but you can just chop them however — we're going to purée everything anyway.
Step 6:

Fry everything together for another 5 minutes or so.
Step 7:

Peel the zucchini if needed and remove any large seeds, then cut it into cubes.
Step 8:

Add it to the slow cooker bowl and cook everything together for 1 hour on the Stew mode.
Step 9:

Purée the vegetables until smooth. If needed, you can run them through a meat grinder.
Step 10:

Add the sugar.
Step 11:

Then the pepper.
Step 12:

Season the caviar with salt.
Step 13:

Pour in the vinegar. Cook for another 30 minutes on the Stew mode.
Step 14:

Sterilize the jars any way you like. I put the jars with a little water inside in the microwave for 5–7 minutes. But you can also sterilize them in the oven at 210°F (100°C) for about 30 minutes, or hold them over steam. For the lids, boiling them for 5 minutes is enough.
Step 15:

Spoon the caviar into the jars and close them tightly with lids or seal them. No further sterilization is needed; store the preserve in a cool place.
Step 16:

Enjoy!

Remember that spices like salt and sugar, as well as vinegar and its substitutes, are used in recipes for winter preserves not just for flavor but, first and foremost, as preservatives. So never reduce the amount of salt and sugar, and never swap the vinegar (essence) for one weaker than the recipe calls for — otherwise the vinegar (and salt/sugar) won't do their preserving job and the batch will spoil.
Which zucchini work best? Choose young ones with tender skin. Wash and peel them. You don't have to cut off very thin skin. If you're using more mature zucchini, cut off the tough peel and scoop out the center with the seeds.
If you're new to canning and don't have much experience with home preserves, it's better to play it safe and sterilize the jars of vegetables, even if the recipe says otherwise. That guarantees the jars won't bulge in storage if you did something wrong — under- or over-measured an ingredient, or didn't follow the method exactly. Remember, jars usually bulge for one reason: excess gases build up inside. And those, in turn, appear because they're released by microorganisms that got into the preserve.