Love that the Aluma Farm recipe helps you understand how much brine to make, depending on how many pickles you’re putting up. Really helpful for those of us pickling on the fly.
Ingredients:
vegetables water salt celery start sugar coriander seeds garlic cloves
Preparation:
Slice your veggies into spears (for carrots that might be in half or quarters, for cucumbers, that might be sixths) and fill as many canning jars as you need. You might need to trim the vegetables to a shorter length to fit.
Take the total volume of jars you filled with veggies and divide it in two to figure out how much brine you need to make.
For instance, if you have four 16-ounce (quart) jars, you have 64 ounces total volume and would need 32 ounces of pickling brine. Combine equal parts water and vinegar to make your brine (if you need 32 ounces total, you would use 16 ounces (2 cups) vinegar and 16 ounces (2 cups) water.)
Heat up the brine, adding several teaspoons regular salt, celery salt to taste, some sugar, some coriander seeds, and as many cloves of garlic as you want (this will all vary by how much total brine you are making.)
A good rule of thumb is 2 teaspoons salt and 1 teaspoon sugar per 8 ounces (1 cup) of pickling liquid, but taste as you add to adjust for your preferences. You can also add any of the following spices: black peppercorns, mustard seeds, fennel seeds, cumin seeds – almost any seeds work!
Bring your brine to a boil, cool for a few minutes, and pour slowly into your jars of sliced veggies! Be careful – sometimes the brine can take a while to percolate down to the bottom of the jar and overflow if you pour too quickly. Put the lids on the jars and stick ’em in the fridge, or can them, following USDA approved canning instructions. Ta-da! You now have homemade pickles!