There was a time when a pickle knew its place.

It sat beside the ham and cheese at Sunday lunch, turned up on Nan’s relish tray, lurked in a jar at the back of the fridge and occasionally found itself speared onto a toothpick alongside a cube of cheddar.

Nobody called it “picklecore”, while “picklemaxxing” certainly wasn’t a thing, and pouring pickle brine into a glass of Pepsi would probably have earned you a stern word from your mother.

Welcome to 2026.

Australia appears to have gone pickle mad. At one end of the food spectrum, KFC recently embraced the craze with a Picklecore menu featuring Pickle Burgers, Frickles, Pickle Loaded Chips, Pickle Ranch Sauce and, yes, Pickle Pepsi Max — served over ice with pickle brine and fresh pickles.

At almost the opposite end sits nutrition and food-tracking app MyFitnessPal, which says Australian users are logging pickles 16 per cent more often than they were a year ago.

According to data released by the company, average monthly pickle logs have also risen by more than 5 per cent month-on-month, with NSW leading the pickle parade, followed by Victoria and Queensland.

Apparently, the gherkin has had a glow-up

For Australians over 60, of course, none of this is particularly new. Long before TikTok discovered fermentation, Australian kitchens had jars of pickled onions, beetroot, cucumbers, chutneys and relishes in the pantry. Preserving whatever was plentiful from the garden wasn’t a food trend, it was simply what people did.

Now the humble pickle has acquired hashtags.

The online #picklecore and #picklemaxxing movements have helped turn briny food into an international phenomenon. Pickle flavour is popping up well beyond the traditional jar, finding its way into snacks, drinks, cocktails and some combinations our grandparents probably had the good sense to avoid.

In Britain, sales of pickled onions have reportedly climbed 12 per cent year-on-year, while artisan producers, chefs and even makers of pickle-flavoured sparkling water have joined the action.

Somewhere, somebody’s grandmother is wondering what all the fuss is about.

There can be a nutritional side to the pickle revival too, although there’s an important distinction between what you’ll find in different jars.

Pickles for gut health!

MyFitnessPal nutritionist and ambassador Michaela Sparrow says certain fermented pickles can contain beneficial bacteria that may support gut health.

“Beyond their distinctive taste, certain fermented pickles can also contain beneficial bacteria that can support gut health, giving the humble pickle something more to offer than flavour alone,” she said.

That doesn’t mean every gherkin suddenly qualifies as health food. Pickles can be high in sodium, while vinegar-pickled products don’t necessarily contain the live cultures associated with fermented foods.

Maybe their appeal is much simpler. Pickles are cheap, punchy, keep for ages and, for plenty of us, taste like something we’ve known since childhood.

And that raises another question: if pickles can become cool again, what’s next?

Retro food has been edging back onto menus for some time. Prawn cocktails, vol-au-vents, trifles and baked Alaska have all been dusted off, while old favourites including quiche Lorraine, bread-and-butter pudding and banana splits have attracted renewed attention.

Devilled eggs are back in various fancy forms. Fondue has never been far from mounting a comeback. Surely the cheese ball is only one viral TikTok away from global domination.

What about curried eggs? Peach Melba? Rum balls? Apricot chicken? Pineapple upside-down cake?

And what price the return of the magnificent vol-au-vent? Should we draw the line at anything involving meat suspended in jelly?

Then again, give it six months, put it on TikTok and call it #AspicCore and we’ll probably be eating that too.

The funny part of the pickle phenomenon is that the generations raised on many of these foods don’t need them rediscovered. We never lost them; we just didn’t know they needed a hashtag.