This year I had extra okra from the garden. So I decided to try something I've never done before, making my own pickled okra. I have always loved the stuff anyway. Since I've never done this before with okra I consulted the Ball complete home preserving book. I do have experience making some bread and butter pickles that are so good you'll slap ya momma to get more, so I'm not new to pickling all together... I had enough okra left to do 4 quarts. So I tried different variations of the recipe. 1 quart following the actual recipe. 1 quart with extra dill seeds, 1 quart of spicy, and one quart with extra garlic.
Here is the basic procedure to get four quarts:
6 cups of water.
6 cups White vinegar
2/3 cup pickling/canning salt
4 tsp dill seeds
8 cloves garlic
Step 1: prep jars, canner and lids
Step 2: combine water, salt, vinegar and dill seeds in a big pot. Bring to a boil and stir to disolve salt.
Step 3: pack okra into hot jars with 2 cloves of garlic in each one. Ladle the hot liquid into the jars till you have 1/2 inch headspace. (One of those funnels specifically for canning really helps here) Stir em around to remove air bubbles and adjust headspace if necessary. Wipe rim and put the lids on finger tight.
Step 3: Put them in the canner and bring to a boil. Process for 15 minutes. Turn the heat off and let the canner depressurize. Remove jars, let them cool and store.
Here is my 4 quarts.
Attachment 1756
My variations were in one jar I added an extra pinch of dill seeds. In another I added 2 sliced and seeded Serano peppers. In another jar I added an extra clove of garlic.
They've been setting for 3 days now and I opened the dill jar to try em out. They are excellent! I'm kinda proud of myself that they turned out so good on my first try. We will gobble these up then I'm gonna try the hot ones next. I'll update the for a report.