How to Make Quick Pickled Vegetables

The April challenge in the 2017 Food in Jars Mastery Challenge was for quick pickles. To be honest, I had a bit of trouble getting interested in this one.

I like pickles just as much as the next gal, but have several kinds of pickles and pickled peppers already in my refrigerator and pantry. Also, I was wanting to do something different, something ‘challenging,’ something I hadn’t done before.

Quick Pickled Vegetables

A couple of summers ago, I ran across this recipe for Taco Pickles (the recipe is at the bottom of the page at that link.)  I thought they sounded good and made them and we ate them with shredded pork tacos and some other things.

I thought about making them again for the April challenge, but in the spirit of trying something different, I instead used this recipe for Quick Pickled Vegetables. Using it as a guide, I used 4 cups of diced vegetables, 1 cup of apple cider vinegar, 1 cup of white vinegar, 2 cups of water, 3 teaspoons of sugar and 3 teaspoons salt.

In most things that my husband and I pickle, we use a combination of apple cider vinegar and white vinegar because we like the flavor combination.  Using all apple cider vinegar makes it too sweet, while all white vinegar is too bitter. Just our opinion and preference!

My Medley of Pickled Vegetables

For the vegetables, I used carrots, radishes, sweet peppers, jalapenos, red onion, and garlic cloves. The garlic isn’t pictured because I almost forgot it. It was added after the photos were taken.

Next time, I think I will add some cucumber too. The problem is the more vegetable types you add, the harder it is to make a small enough amount to fit in one jar. That was my goal here.

When I had all of the vegetables ready to go, I put them in the jar (this is about a quart or so, I believe it’s a 1.3-liter jar.  It was the second one I had to sterilize because the first one I had out to use was smaller and was not large enough.)

Once this larger jar was ready, everything I had diced fit into it except about 10 pieces of carrots.  My Brittany spaniel Bill was happy to have an afternoon snack. The dogs don’t usually get their carrot snacks cut all fancy.  Once the vegetables were in the jar, I poured the warm brine mixture over them to within an inch or so of the top.

This happened on Saturday and then, these beauties sat in the fridge for a day before we tried them.  We had a bit of a smoked meat extravaganza on Sunday to get some food ready to go for the week. My husband made pork shoulder, chicken, and brats. I am happy to report that these quick pickles were awesome with all of these things. We bought ourselves a new Masterbuilt Electric Smoker for Christmas and we love it! It is now Tuesday and the jar is almost half gone.

Pickled Ginger

In my quick pickles research, I also found a recipe for pickled ginger.  I decided to give this a try with a chunk of ginger I had in my refrigerator.