Whether you’re overrun with vegetables from your garden or the farmer’s market, or just simply a pickle aficionado, quick pickling is an easy way to preserve vegetables and make pickles fast!
Depending on the type of vegetable you use and how it is sliced or prepared, you can add pickles to charcuterie boards, salads, sandwiches, tacos, and more.
I recently wrote a post about quick pickling onions, and one thing I really like about pickling process is that it mellows the harsh flavor of pungent vegetables like onions.
Different Ways to Make Pickles
If you’re new to pickling, there’s three main ways to make a pickle:
- fermenting
- canning
- quick pickling or refrigerator pickling
Fermenting is the longest process because it requires microbes and bacteria to naturally preserve vegetables in a brine at room temperature. It also develops the best flavor and is the most gut-healthy.
Canning pickles is probably the most labor-intensive, but will yield pickles that are shelf-stable for a year or more.
Finally, there’s quick pickling.
What Is Quick Pickling?
Quick pickling is a way to easily pickle food in a short amount of time without a ton of labor. It’s much easier to quick pickle rather than pickle using the traditional fermentation process that can take days or even weeks, or the more labor intensive process of canning.
Also called “refrigerator pickling” or “quickling”, quick pickling typically involves creating a brine made from vinegar, water, salt, and sometimes sugar, along with various seasonings or spices. The vegetables are peeled, sometimes cut into spears or slices, then placed in the brine and left to marinate in the refrigerator for a short amount of time, allowing the flavors to develop quickly.
What I like about this process is that quick pickling doesn’t require canning or long fermentation times. It’s a convenient way to make pickled foods and be able to eat them the same day for dinner or to share for a party.
10 Garden Vegetables to Quick Pickle
There are tons of vegetables to quick pickle. It’s almost easier to name the vegetables you can’t quickle!
Some vegetables are better for refrigerator pickling than others because they keep their flavor and crunch better. Plus some vegetables grow more prolifically and produce an excess in the garden more than others. I find that I’m more likely to quick pickle these over harder-to-grow vegetables.
Keeping all this in mind, I’m listing my top 10 favorite homegrown vegetables to quick pickle. I grow lots of these vegetables in my own garden each year, and if you garden, you probably do, too.
Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. This means that if you buy through my links, I could earn a small commission, at no extra cost to you. I only discuss products that I love and think you’ll love, too. I’m glad you’re here and thanks for reading!
Cucumbers
We can’t talk about anything pickle-related without mentioning cucumbers. Quick pickling is a fantastic way to make cucumber pickles fast. Because the cukes aren’t heated by the canning process, they stay crisp instead of turning limp and rubbery. Pickling them in the vinegar-based brine of your choice will give them that classic pickle flavor in just a couple hours.
Slice cukes with a crinkle cutter to make pickle chips for adding to burgers and sandwiches. Cut them into spears and have them with a Chicago-style hotdog. Or you can even pickle cucumbers whole. Small, quick pickled gherkins make a great addition to a charcuterie board!
Cucumbers are very versatile and perfect for quick pickling.
Zucchini
Much like cucumbers, zucchini absorbs flavor from the pickling brine quite well. These are fun to cut into ribbons for pickling, but you can also slice them thinly like cucumbers.
Pickled zucchini relish is a great dish to make with quick pickled zucchini, especially if you’re running low on cukes but swimming in zukes!
Carrots
Sliced thin or cut into matchsticks, carrots also quickly absorb brine and stay crunchy. They also retain their color and look beautiful in a jar.
I like to mix julienned carrots with similarly cut daikon radish. These are great to have with pulled pork as it really cuts through the sweet flavor of the barbecue sauce and fattiness of the pork.
Onions
Pickled onion slices are easily my favorite condiment. I wrote a full recipe on making my quick pickled red onions if you want to read about that process.
They are very versatile and have a milder, less pungent flavor after pickling. I typically slice mine into thin rings before pickling.
Mini Peppers
This category includes both sweet and hot mini peppers. Tiny peppers look so cute pickled whole and served on a charcuterie board, or on a skewer with other pickled vegetables or cheese.
I’m growing red Biquinho peppers this year to pickle, but I have also pickled small hot peppers like cayennes successfully.
Jalapeños
I’m putting jalapeño peppers in their own category because I grow a lot of these plants, specifically for turning the peppers into various condiments like my jalapeño relish and fresh red chili garlic sauce. Sliced, pickled jalapeños are perfect for nachos, tacos, and anywhere you need a hit of heat and tang.
Green Beans
About halfway through summer, we start getting overrun with green beans. Green beans can be pickled whole, with stems and strings removed, and make a great little snack. They also taste great in a salad. Pickled green beans will stay crisp after pickling, but will be more tender and zesty. I think green beans are best pickled with a few cloves of garlic or with several sprigs of fresh dill.
Garlic
Like pickled onions, pickled garlic becomes mild and sweet after the pickling process. Garlic has many health benefits like antiviral properties, boosting the immune system, reducing blood pressure, protecting against cognitive decline, and more, as this article from Healthline indicates.
So, let food be your medicine, and make and eat more pickled garlic! Try substituting pickled garlic for fresh in pasta salads, garlic bread, or roasts.
Beets
I am a big fan of pickled beets. The earthy, beet flavor doesn’t bother me, but I know some people strongly dislike it! If you are a beet-lover or you are growing beets in your garden, try peeling, slicing, and pickling a few! Young beets are the best candidate for fresh, quick pickles. Big, old beets are better after being roasted, in my opinion.
Tomatoes
Pickled tomatoes may not have been the first thing you thought of pickling, but give it a try, because they are fantastic. I like to make a small batch of garlic pickled cherry tomatoes at the end of the tomato season once tomatoes have passed their peak. Green tomatoes are also wonderful candidates for pickling because they are firmer than ripe tomatoes and easy to slice for pickling.
Make Your Own Pickles at Home
Quick pickling is a great way to preserve homegrown garden vegetables and make pickles fast. There are so many different vegetables to try quickling and the low-labor method of refrigerator pickling makes it easy to give pickle-making a try this season.
If you’re really into pickling and would like to try growing your own vegetables to pickle, you may be interested in this small garden plan of vegetables for pickling that I posted here.
Whether you’re growing your own vegetables, or getting them from someone else who grew them, I hope you feel excited to try making quick pickles at home.
It really is a fun, easy food preservation project that anyone can do.
Let me know what vegetables you want to try quick pickling!