Canning mixed pickled mixed veggies

17 years ago

Okay now I am wondering if what I canned is okay. I went by a recipe that called for peppers, onions, carrots, cukes , celery and cauliflower being pickled in a brine of 2/3 c water+1/3 c vinegar and 1Tbs salt ( made a multiple of the brine). I packed the jars and added boiling brine, then added dill heads and dried Colorado Chiles and processed pints 15 minutes and Quarts 20 minutes in a BWB. I also used the same brine and veggies to make some refrigerator pickles. Now I am wondering if it was okay to do. I would hate to make anyone sick. I love canning and have done over 150 jars in the past month but this is a new recipe to me. Any ideas would be great.

BTW the refrigerator pickled ones taste soooo good, I had a neighbor come over and try them and we both loved them. Then my 3 yr old had to try them and I can't keep her away from them:)

Stacie

Who needs to find more pickling cukes to make pickles for the 3 yr old addicted pickle eater

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Comments (6)

ksrogers
17 years ago
Pickles usually need about a month to fully cure. As to all the veggies, I would have added more vinegar and less water, like 2/3 vinegar and 1/3 water. If they were spiced and sweetend, it may be fine provided the original recipe is one that is safe for home canning. Sometimes even processing up to an hour with a relativly low acid mix, and low acid brine like you mentioned, may not be safe. Not to scare you though. When I make a sweet pickle mix, I use straight vinegar which will also have some cider vinegar, and omit the celery. I do add cauliflower, small whole onions (pearl type), as well as a few clices of sweet red peppers, and cukes cut up. The carrots I use are the small baby ones I see in stores. I go out every 3-4 days and pick cukes. This morning I had enough for 4 quarts, and 4 pints of spicy dills. I also have another bunch of cukes ready for making another batch of mustard pickles.
readinglady
17 years ago
I'm interested in the source of your recipe. The lowest vinegar to water ratio I've seen in tested recipes is 50-50.

The Joy of Pickling has a nice Giardiniera recipe that I've had good luck with.

Carol
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What is the brand? If its Mrs Wages, you will find that it does contain a small amount of alum, which is added to assist in keeping the cukes a bit crisper. Vinegar and salt are notorious for breaking down cucmbers. Start with very fresh (picked the same day!) pickling cukes. Instead of adding any water, which tends to dilute the brine and raise procsssing times, I prefer to use full strength 5% vinegar. For the heat processing, I don't do a BWB for very long, maybe about 10 minutes tops. This is usually OK if the vinegar is not watered down by adding any water. For Mrs. Wages, I also make a half sour dill pickle using the regular dill pickle mix. I add plenty of dill weed, and time my cukes to the point where the dill is producing green swelled seed heads, which I add to the jars prior to filling with cukes. I cut off the end tips from BOTH ends of the cukes. Also, add a few garlic cloves cut into pieces. For the half sours, no vinegar is used, only water, and I taste the salt brine to see if its got enough salt. The brine flavor is a bit hard to get to, unless you have been able to do some taste testing and get to the 'mouth watering' stage of water and salt ratios. Another option is to weigh out 5 1/2 to 6 ounces of the pickle mix, to a gallon of water. No boiling necessary and you simply pour the dissolved salt brine into the packed jars. I use half gallons for these, and they sit on the counter about 3 days, to partially 'cure', then get placed in the fridge. At that time, I add a tablesppon or two of white vinegar. This helps to halt any further fermentation (lactic acid type) Mine keep quite crisp for almost a year in the fridge. By the next growing season, they are usually all gone. Ball brand pickle mixes tend to contain sugar, and I really don't know why, so I don'[t buy the dill ones. Mrs. Wages don't contain any sugar, but have a lot of dill flavor. Kosher and Polish dills, The Kosher packets contain cracked peppercorns, the Polish also contain some garlic. For regular vinegar based pickles, as mentioned, a shorter process time (flling the packed jars with boiling brine) is helpful. If I were to make these with some kind of strict recipe, it would require hair nets, rubber gloves, high heat burners, a hose down of my whole kitchen, high efficiency filters for reducing airborne bacteria, and any other things to prevent any possible contamination of any kind. Keep in mind that with the vinegar at the full strength level, nothing hamful can survive that. As a final note, Ball used to offer a product called Pickle Crisp. After only a couple of years they discontinued it. Instead, I buy food grade calcium chloride from Bulk Foods, which is the same exact ingredient as the Pickle Crisp, only in a slightly larger granule size. I add the PC just before filling each jar with boiling brine. Calcium Chloride is also used in commercial pickles and in whole canned tomatoes. The calcium chloide in a non food grade is used as an ice melter in winter. It helps to 'buffer' the acidic effects of vinegar.
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Carol, Thanks for the great link! I hope you don't mind if I post it over on the Hot Pepper Forum (I'll give you credit for the find). Great info for pepper folks gathering their harvest as the season ends on our side of the planet. Bill
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Jim writes: The other option is to use an approved recipe and substitute the vinegar, or a portion of it, with citric acid (which has no flavor). Didn't know could do that. Have any recipes? John, The rule is as follows: 2 Tbsp of bottled 5% vinegar is equivalent to, 1 Tbsp of bottled commercial lemon or lime juice, and that is equivalent to, 1/4 tsp food grade citric acid. So, if you are putting up quarts of tomatoes, and acidification is recommended, you can use any one of the following: 4 Tbsp of 5% vinegar, or 2 Tbsp of bottled lemon or lime juice, or 1/2 tsp citric acid. Citric acid is readily available, cheap, and in France it is called "sour salt". If you have a child that likes Gummy Bears or other such similar sweet/sour product, citric acid is what creates the "pucker response" in those candies. Hope this helps. I use citric acid where I don't want the flavor of the other things. If I want tomatoes for soup, I would never put either vinegar or lemon juice in the tomatoes. I would rather use the citric acid and then flavor the soup to my own sense of proper flavoring - rather than trying to cover the flavor of vinegar or lime juice. Jim in So Calif
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<Would the 3.5 cups sugar in the NCHFP Mixed Veg recipe make for a pretty sweet pickle, like a bread & butter? If so can I reduce the sugar or take it out entirely and not negatively affect the texture of the vegetables? I don't want a sweet pickle, just vinegary- salty.> Yeah you can reduce it. In theory you could leave it out completely but note that is a straight vinegar recipe, not diluted. So much of the sugar is there to off-set some of the vinegar taste. Just sugar your brine to your taste before filling the jars with it - sample it in other words first. You might also want to try making it with cider vinegar rather than white for a more mellow taste with less 'bite'. <So would a combination of green beans, small green grape tomatoes, carrots, celery, cauliflower, onions, peppers, etc. be ok regardless of the proportions of each, as long as I stick to 1:1 Vinegar to water or stronger?> Technically, yes, but it is the absolute bottom minimum and make sure it is 5%. Personally I wouldn't make it that weak. I prefer a bit more margin of safety and a longer shelf life so I go with a 2:1 ratio of vinegar to water. But there again, taste it first before filling the jars and adjust as needed. Dave
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Linda_Lou
17 years ago
Sorry, it is not safe. You need at least half vinegar that is 5 % acidity vinegar to water ratio. They are low acid vegetables and must have at least that much acid to water bath them or vegetables must be pressure canned to be safe.

Where did you get the recipe? Always consider where they come from. Stick with things that are USDA tested or from the Ball Blue book, etc. Many people write books and post recipes who have no idea of what is safe. Many older pickling recipes are unsafe because vinegar used to be up to 40% acidity. Even some of our vinegar now in the stores say only 4% acidity. They are not safe to use in pickling foods.
girlsingardens
Original Author
17 years ago
Okay,

You all got me nervous about my recipe. I posted the wrong ratio for the brine. That is what I used for my refrigerator mixed pickles. I went searching and here is the recipe for brine:

6 cups vinegar
3 cups water
2 Tbs pickling salt
1-2 Tbs sugar ( I used 1 Tbs)

Pack pickles, boil brine, process pints 10 minutes and quarts 15 minutes.

I knew about the ratio of at least half vinegar to water ratio, this one is the opposite of the one that I posted first:)

I got the recipe from the Colorado State extension site, I usually am very careful about what I can and how I do it. My grandma always told me the story of a family of 6 that all died after eating improperly canned green beans. This story was told every year when I started canning;)

Stacie who is glad that she found the recipe before she threw out the pickles.

Stacie

Here is a link that might be useful: colorado mixed pickle recipe
readinglady
17 years ago
Good as gold. A very reliable site and a really great sounding recipe.

I'm very glad it turned out that the vinegar and water ratios had been reversed in the original post and you don't have to discard all that hard work.

Carol
ksrogers
17 years ago
When I make a vinegar based product, I don't usually add any water. I prefer to taste all the vinegar and not have a mild, watered down pickle. The same holds true for my mustard pickles. These are a very strong flavor mustard sauce and once the veggies cure in it, the mix will be milder, due to the veggies exuding some water.

Canning mixed pickled mixed veggies

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Canning mixed pickled mixed veggies

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