Now that you mentioned olives, I went back and looked at my Joy of Pickling book and realized that any recipe with olives is stored in the refrigerator. I was looking for a gardieneria recipe. Boy, are there ever a lot of unsafe ones out there! People canning all sorts of stuff with tons of olive oil, olives, veggies and little to no processing. Most of the instructions say " seal the jars and they will store on the shelves for up to a year". Yikes!

Yes, you can omit the horseradish. You could use the already pickled stuff you find in the deli case. Frankly, I HATE grating fresh horseradish. That was my job as a kid when Gram put up gallons of the stuff (the adults had already suffered enough in their childhood, so us kids had to be the graters), and for 1 tablespoon, it's not worth the pain and tears. Yes, you can leave out the sugar. I see she recommends either white wine or distilled white vinegar. If I was using white wine vinegar, I, for sure, would leave out the sugar. Distilled is sharper, so a little bit of sugar does help cut the harshness. Try tasting the brine - if it needs some sweetness to cut the vinegar taste, add a small amount at a time until the flavor is where you want it (in addition, it should mellow after some time on the shelf, so you might not need as much sugar in the beginning as you think).

You can use the NCHFP Pepper and Onion Relish recipe, sub hot peppers for the sweet peppers as long as you keep the total amounts the same, and add your pineapple to taste with no safety issues as it is acidic and the recipe is a 100% vinegar recipe. You will need to pack the jars loosely with sufficient brine so all the vegetables pieces are exposed to the liquid. You can drain it after opening. Then there is the Hot Pepper Relish recipe. You could also add the pineapple and the juice to it as it is also 100% vinegar. Neither include the carrots but a few grated carrots would be ok as long as you don't over do and keep the relish soupy for processing. Density and heat penetration could be come an issue if you make the relish TOO thick. Dave

Be sure to read the notes that are after the recipe. You can use any type of pepper(s) you want as long as the total remains the same. "In order to adjust the hot pepper intensity of the finished product, the proportion of sweet to hot peppers may be adjusted according to taste and the variety of hot pepper provided that the total amount of measured ground pepper is not altered. In other words, with all other ingredients measured as specified in the recipe, there should be no more than 10 cups of ground peppers." Rodney