Pickling spice

Do you prepare your own pickle spice blend? If so, what spices do you include?
Any pickling/brine blend you buy already prepared? If so, what brand do you recommend?

TIA
Rooste

Apparently Seth Rogan makes an excellent preservative for pickles.
(see An American Pickle now streaming on HBO Max, cute enough movie even though Seth Rogan tends to annoy me)

Watched it two days ago after reading this article. It was okay but the references were fun.

Looking for a few pickling spice recommendations.

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I always buy pickling spice. But, no help to you, it’s usually my normal supermarket’s own brand.

https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/spices/sainsburys-pickling-spice-30g-7778335-p-44

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Ingredients
Coriander Seeds, Mustard Seeds, Ginger, Black Pepper, Cloves, Pimento, Bay Leaf, Mace, Birds Eye Chilli.

Actually, their ingredient list is very helpful. Do you add anything to it?

@Rooster, I buy pickling spice from Penzey’s, and love their blend for most things. But if making pickled beans or asparagus I’ll look up and make my brine using a different blend of spices. This is when I want the product to be dilly, so it will be things like mustard seeds, hot peppers, fresh dill and pickling salt typically. Garlic too usually.

Penzey’s works well in Greek stifado, corned beef, bread and butter type pickles or pickled beets, for our palates.

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Here’s a photo of the McCormick Pickling Spice blend I buy at the supermarket.

It’s okay for me. I use it to make quick refrigerator pickles in summer when produce is popping like crazy. Though there have to be more delicious answers, this one’s expedient.

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No, it works fine as it is. I’m usually pickling small onions (perhaps the most common British pickled veg). I usually add a big pinch of the spice to each jar (although I do pick through it and discard most of the chilli as I find it gives it too much of an edge over the months.)

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Yes. Somewhat different for refrigerator pickles, carrots, and onions. I can look them up if you’re interested. Nothing particularly exotic. I try to avoid pre-made mixes; too much salt.

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If you have time, sure I would appreciate it. I want as much info as possible before I begin prep. Thanks.

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Sure. The refrigerator pickles are a family recipe and my wife has all those. I’ll get that from her tonight or tomorrow morning depending on how work and dinner go. grin

For onions in addition to vinegar and a little sugar I use salt and red pepper flakes. I eyeball that.

For 1# carrots 1-1/4 T dill, 1 t salt, 1/4 t mustard seeds, 1/4 t coriander, 1/4 t tumeric, again in addition to vinegar.

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Turmeric, I hadn’t consudered. :+1:
I may wind up doing a few diff blends so I can play with flavor.

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Which is one of the real benefits of DIY. That and reducing unintended salt.

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I’ve made pickling spice specifically for pastrami. It’s typically a once a year thing, when corned point cuts of brisket briefly become avaliable. I don’t have the recipe right now, but suspect i usually find it on a BBQ forum. I have a pastrami bookmark with lots of links, but i think I usually start with beef that is already “corned”.

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I make my own pickling mix for fermented cucumber pickles: dill seed, mustard seed, coriander seed, peppercorns, allspice, bay leaf, dried hot pepper.

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Equal measures of each ingredient?

For a quart of pickles:
1 tsp mustard, coriander, peppercorns
1/2 tsp allspice, dill seed
1 bay leaf, 1 dried pepper
And a smashed garlic clove (unsmashed if you like your garlic more subtle), and a dill head.

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Thank you!

Giving this a try.

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Good luck! Cut cukes can get mushy, so don’t skimp on the bay leaves.

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