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Spiced Pickled Beets - Guest Post from Jen at the Our Food Project
Author: Cristina
Ingredients
  • 7 lbs small red beets (the smaller the sweeter)
  • 5 cups apple cider vinegar
  • 2 cups water
  • 1 cup sugar (or honey)
  • 5 tsp pickling salt
  • 8 tsp mustard seeds
  • 8 whole star anise
  • 8 whole cloves (one per jar)
  • 1 stick cinnamon
  • 4 tsp coriander seeds
  • 4 tsp black peppercorns
Necessary Tools: canner (or large, deep pot), canning rack, canning jars and lids, tongs, a ladle and a wide-mouth funnel.
Note: The spices in this recipe add amazing flavour to pickled beets, but are not required. Simply ignore the spices for a more classic pickled beet flavour. It is necessary to include the sugar, vinegar, and pickling salt for this to be shelf stable. It's also not necessary to follow the home canning process if you intend to store these directly in your fridge and consume in a few months.
Instructions
  1. Wash and trim the end of beets.
  2. Boil beets until tender, 30 – 35min (a fork should be able to poke through, but not too easily)
  3. In the meantime, wash jars with hot, soapy water and rinse well. Place jars in the canner (or large, deep pot) with enough water to cover them. Bring to a boil. Boil for 10 minutes, sterilizing the jars. Leave the jars in the canner until you are ready to fill them.
  4. Place the canning lids in a small bowl or pot and pour very hot water over them. Allow them to sit a few minutes in the water to soften until you are ready to use them.
  5. Place beets in bowl with cold water and let cool off for approx. 30 minutes
  6. Peel skins – they should slide off easily once cooled. Chop into byte size pieces.
  7. In a large pot, combine vinegar, salt, sugar, cinnamon stick, and water and bring to a boil over medium/high heat. Stir often until sugar has dissolved (about 5 min)
  8. Into each 500ml canning jar, place 1tsp mustard seeds, 1 clove, 1 star anise, ½ tsp peppercorns and coriander seeds.
  9. Pack the beets in the jar, leaving approximately 1 inch headspace (the space between the beets and the rim of the jar)
  10. Using a funnel, ladle the hot vinegar brine over the beets, leaving ½ headspace. Remove air bubbles by running a non-metallic utensil around the inside of the jar. Add more brine if necessary.
  11. Wipe the rim of the jar to remove any food spills. Place the snap lid and metal screw band on the jar, only finger tight.
  12. Cover with sterilized lids, only screw on lids until they are finger tight.
  13. Now you are ready to “process” the jars in the hot water bath. Place the filled jars into the canner of boiling water. Ensure that the water covers the jars by a minimum of 1inch. Process jars for 30minutes.
  14. Remove the jars from the canner without tilting. Do not tighten the screw bands or move the jars for a number of hours. You will likely hear a popping sound when the seal forms. You can test the seals by checking that the centre of the snap lid curves downward. Store your jars in a cool, dark place.