Small batch preserving these Pickled Carrots is easier than you think. Grow your own or buy carrots in season, then pickle them with dill and garlic for a dillicious treat!
Pickled Carrots with Dill and Garlic
Whether you’re the sort of person who enjoys preserving and canning or a supermarket pickle shopper, this recipe is for you!
Capture the sweetness of fresh carrots alongside fresh dill and intense garlic by pickling your very own at home.
These pickles have just the right ‘pucker power’ as declared by our family of pickle lovers. We love to eat them straight out of the jar, with other pickles, or on a platter with fun appetizers like Nacho Deviled Eggs.
My Pickled Carrot Inspiration
We moved to Calgary in 1998 when our daughter Julia was 3 weeks old. New city, new baby, new house, new job…it was a huge step for us.
Soon I learned that gardening is much different in Calgary that it is in Saskatchewan. The shorter summer season sometimes makes it quite tricky to produce a decent yield. I started out small by growing the simple things: Peas, Beans, Lettuce, and Carrots.
It just so happened that my very first harvest from that garden coincided with Julia’s first birthday. She wouldn’t eat baby food and went straight from milk to these solids: toast, yogurt, and pickles. What a fun combination! I pickled everything I could from that first garden harvest…including carrots!
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Handy Equipment for Making Pickled Carrots
While small batch canning is a relatively simple method to learn, you will need a few key pieces of kitchen equipment to help things go smoothly:
- water bath canner (or a large stock pot).
- a rack that fits inside the canner or pot (can be made of metal or silicone). One with handles is best but not necessary.
- a ladle or measuring cup for pouring brine.
- a jar lifter
- a magnetic wand (for grabbing those lids and rings out of the hot water)
- a timer
- glass jars with two piece lids.
- another pot for the brine.
How to Choose the Best Carrots for Pickling
You don’t need to grow your own carrots for this recipe. However, I suggest buying the fresh, young carrots (with a diameter of around 1 cm) from your local farmer’s market. If you must use larger carrots, make sure they don’t taste ‘old’, give them a good peel and quarter them length ways.
How to Make Pickled Carrots
CANNING PREPARATION
- Fill a hot water bath canner (with a canning rack) with water and bring to a boil while you:
- Scrub and trim baby carrots to fit a pint jar. Peel, trim, and quarter mature carrots length ways. Clean and prep garlic and dill.
- Wash and inspect 6 pint jars (I always do an extra jar just in case) and their lids. Be sure there are no chips on the jar rims and that there’s no rust or dents on the lids.
- Sterilize Jars – Set jars upside down in a large cake pan, add an inch or two of water. Place in a 250 F oven for ten minutes and keep warm until you are ready to fill them.
- Sterilize Lids – Place lids and lid rings into a pot and fill with water. Set on stove and heat until they just begin to boil.
- Fill a kettle with water and bring to a boil.
- Make Brine – Add water, vinegar, and salt to a medium pot. Bring to a boil so that the salt dissolves.
STUFF THE JARS
- Take jars out of the oven one at a time and add one half of garlic followed by a flowering dill head.
- Quickly but purposefully arrange the carrots in the pint jar until the are so tightly packed you can’t add any more.
- Ram another garlic half into the carrots, then add a pinch of dill seed. Top with hot brine, leaving 1 cm head space.
- Quickly cover with hot lid and screw on the sealing ring until it’s just tight, but not crazy tight.
HOT WATER PROCESSING
- Place jar in canning rack and repeat until all your jars are finished. If your hot water canner looks too full of boiling water, remove some. If you need more, take it from the kettle.
- Lower the canning rack into the canner. Make sure there’s an inch of water above the jars.
- Process at a rolling boil for 10 minutes at sea level or 20 minutes at over 3000 ft altitude (or see hot water processing chart HERE), adding boiling water as needed to make sure the jars are covered.
- Remove and let sit on counter overnight before moving. Check to make sure all jars have sealed (the lids should be depressed in their centres) and refrigerate any that have not sealed.
- Allow pickles to sit in the brine for a few weeks. Enjoy!
How Long Should I Store My Pickled Carrots?
When stored in a cool, dark spot properly sealed pickled carrots will last for 5 – 6 months. However, I have some just past the year mark and they are just fine.
Do not consume if the brine has clouded, smells odd, or becomes carbonated. When in doubt, throw it out!
Helpful Hints For Pickled Carrots
- Keep small carrots whole or peel and quarter older carrots. Cutting them this way will make it possible to pack them tightly in the jar. Measure how long they need to be using one of your pint jars and cut them all to size at once.
- Have everything (carrots, dill, dill seed, garlic, hot brine) ready and waiting for when it’s time to pack the jars is key.
- Jars, brine, and waterbath must be hot (or boiling in the case of the waterbath).
- Do not over tighten the lids. Air needs to escape during the hot water canning process.
- Processing time differs according to altitude.
If you make these Pickled Carrots, please be sure to leave a comment and/or give this recipe a rating! Be sure to follow me on Facebook and Pinterest for my latest recipes. Also, if you do make this recipe, please tag me on Instagram, I’d love to see what you guys are making! Thank you so much for reading my blog.
Pickled Carrots with Dill and Garlic
Small batch preserving Pickled Carrots is easier than you think. Grow your own or buy carrots in season, then pickle them with dill and garlic for a dill-icious treat!
Ingredients
FOR THE BRINE
- 4 cups water
- 4 cups white vinegar
- 1/2 cup salt (pickling salt or sea salt)
FOR THE JARS
- 6 lbs baby carrots; scrubbed or regular carrots; peeled
- 5 cloves garlic; peeled and cut in half lengthwise
- 1 tbsp dill seed
- 5 heads of flowering fresh dill
Instructions
- Fill a hot water bath canner (with a canning rack) with water and bring to a boil while you:
- Scrub and trim baby carrots to fit a pint jar. Peel, trim, and quarter mature carrots length ways.
- Wash and inspect 6 pint jars (I always do an extra jar just in case) and their lids. Be sure there are no chips on the jar rims and that there's no rust or dents on the lids.
- Set jars upside down in a large cake pan, add an inch or two of water. Place in a 250 F oven for ten minutes and keep warm until you are ready to fill them.
- Place lids and lid rings into a pot and fill with water. Set on stove and heat until they just begin to boil.
- Fill a kettle with water and bring to a boil.
- Add water, vinegar, and salt to a medium pot. Bring to a boil so that the salt dissolves.
- Clean and prep garlic and dill.
- Take jars out of the oven one at a time and add one half of garlic followed by a flowering dill head.
- Quickly but purposefully arrange the carrots in the pint jar until the are so tightly packed you can't add any more.
- Ram another garlic half into the carrots, then add a pinch of dill seed. Top with hot brine, leaving 1 cm head space.
- Quickly cover with hot lid and screw on the sealing ring until it's just tight, but not crazy tight.
- Place jar in canning rack and repeat until all your jars are finished. If your hot water canner looks too full of boiling water, remove some. If you need more, take it from the kettle.
- Lower the canning rack into the canner. Make sure there's an inch of water above the jars.
- Process at a rolling boil for 10 minutes at sea level or 20 minutes at over 3000 ft altitude (or see hot water processing chart HERE), adding boiling water as needed to make sure the jars are covered.
- Remove and let sit on counter overnight before moving. Check to make sure all jars have sealed (the lids should be depressed in their centres) and refrigerate any that have not sealed.
- Allow pickles to sit in the brine for a few weeks. Enjoy!
STUFF THE JARS
HOT WATER PROCESSING
Nutrition Information:
Yield:
30 servingsServing Size:
1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 39Total Fat: 0gSaturated Fat: 0gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 0gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 1960mgCarbohydrates: 8gFiber: 3gSugar: 4gProtein: 1g
Nutritional calculation was provided by Nutritionix and is an estimation only. For special diets or medical issues please use your preferred calculator.
Hello. I am brand new to rhe picklung world but want a new delicious way to get more carrots into my diet for gut and hormone health. Have you ever expieremented with more of a quick pickle recipe? How about adding or using half of apple cider vinegar for more gut benefits. I haven’t really found any recipes around that take that into consideration while still tasting like classic pickles with crunch. I would love your opinion or take on that. You seem reallt knowledgeable! I want to get into pickling but am not prepared to buy some of the equipment and extra jars for now. Is it possible to turn this recipe into what I’m looking for? Thanks in adavnce, Amie
Hi Amie, this is more of a standard pickle recipe. It requires the standard equipment like jars, lids and a large hot water bath canner. I don’t have any recipes for quick pickles, although I do it at home fairly regularly. If you are looking for more of a fermentation recipe, I have a recipe for making homemade sauerkraut. It takes much less equipment and effort but delivers many benefits, including gut health and vitamins. Here is the link: https://dishnthekitchen.com/authentic-homemade-sauerkraut/
[…] Pickled Carrots with Dill and Garlic (Dishnkitchen)- Small batch preserving these Pickled Carrots is easier than you think. Grow your own or buy carrots in season, then pickle them with dill and garlic for a dillicious treat! […]
Oh, my goodness, this has become a beloved treat in our family! My children and my grandchildren just love them and eagerly welcomed new batches for Christmas presents last year. I just harvested a new batch of carrots and fresh dill. Such a healthy and easy treat to can!
Thank you Donna. I’m glad your family loves these pickled carrots as much as mine does.
I am a beginner at this.
I saw a person cold bath canning – using vinegar, sugar, and canned all kinds of veggies.
Squash, carrots, cabbage, etc.
Do you have recipe for this?
sincerly
Ruth Bush
No I do not. Are you talking about quick pickling where the pickles are stored in the refrigerator? Those recipes do not make shelf stable pickles like mine does.
Getting ready to make these!
Can I use 4 1Litre jars and double the recipe? Thanks
I suppose you could…as long as the 1 litre jars fit properly in your canner and you adjust the processing time accordingly. The times I have posted are for 500 ml jars only.
Has anyone ever added sugar to this recipe ? I see a lot of recipes with sugar ?
Hi Kathy, sugar won’t hurt anything however these aren’t sweet pickles. They are garlic dill pickles.
How do you keep carrots from getting soft ?
Hi Marion. If you start with fresh carrots, use the cold pack method and use the correct processing time for your altitude, this is a non issue. I still have pickled carrots I did last year that are not soft.
can I use distilled vinegar? …
Yes, for sure. Use distilled vinegar with at least 7% acetic acid content.
Pickled carrot is my fave but never tried to make it at home. And now I can’t wait to try this recipe!
Hello Linda, pickled carrots are a favourite around here too. I’ve been making this recipe for at least 20 years so you know it’s a good one!
I’m in pickling mode so these are next on my list! Thanks for sharing.
Happy pickling Denise!!
Oh these were just amazing….and so easy to make too! I’ll definitely be making them again.
So great to hear Debra, thank you for letting me know! I have to make another batch very soon while the local carrots are still small.
ok so i used a different recipie and was supposed to just add salt to the jars before putting in my brine. Like an idiot i forgot the salt!!! will these pickled carrots still be ok to eat?
Hi Clay, I can’t speak to the safety of another recipe as I don’t know the amount of vinegar used in the brine. The flavour will be off for sure, but in terms of food safety it’s the pH that matters when it comes to food preservation. In home canning the pH must always be below 4.6 and for pickles, it should be about half that to get the proper flavour.
In modern home canning, the accepted rule of thumb for safe vinegar / water pickling solutions is that the vinegar should be of at least 5% acidity, and that the vinegar ratio in that mix should be a minimum of 50%. So that is, 50 % of 5% acid vinegar / 50% water.
Now if you were fermenting pickles, this answer would be no as salt is required for a proper ferment.
It’s fine to raise the vinegar to 60% and lower the water to 40%, but you can’t do the opposite: it’s not okay to lower the vinegar.
You are sooo right about Calgary gardening be VERY different than other prairie provinces. I took a gardening class years ago and was shocked that there are 7 different gardening zones in this city! You cannot grow cedars in the north, but you can downtown. It was very smart to start small.!
Wow! I didn’t know that.
Great recipe! Love that your daughter was so pro-pickle as a baby. Lol. Funny enough, I (apparently) loved pickle juice as a baby, and then went on to loathe dill pickles for many years to come. But something clicked in me, and I find myself drawn to dill more and more these days. I walked by a fresh bunch of it at the market yesterday and it just called to me. To that end, this recipe is perfectly timed! I’m way too out of practice with my pickling, so I think it’s time to get myself going again with these awesome pickled carrots!
Excellent. Yeah I’m not sure why she has such odd food preferences but it was no surprise to me that she eventually became vegan. Fresh dill is irresistible and I always have to make at least one batch of these carrots a year.
Pickling is so fun this recipe is delicious.
It sure is satisfying…especially when you finally get to taste it.
I would have never thought of pickling carrots, but, don’t all vegetables taste better pickled? Pinning this one for later as I’m sure i’ll have an abundance of carrots this summer that I won’t know what to do with!
They sure do. I pickled radishes for the first time this year and loved them on everything, especially tacos.
LOVE pickled carrots! They make such a great side for salads, sammies and rice bowls. PINned to pick later!
Yes, they sure do! We eat a lot of pickles in this house.
This brings back so many memories. Growing up my mom would pickle carrots for us to enjoy all winter long. It was one of my favourite “pickles” at dinner time.
Agree. Actually I kind of like them better than pickled cucumbers.
Love pickled carrots. I canned 80 jars this year of various fruits and veggies, but carrots are the number one in our family! Thanks for sharing your recipe.
yes, they’ve always been a huge hit with our kids too. Thanks for stopping by Kristen.
What is your brine recipe please ?
I love pickled carrots with dill and garlic and can’t find the perfect brine.. any help is appreciated 😊
The brine recipe is located in the main recipe card at the bottom of this post.
This is super thorough! I love the flavours of dill and garlic so this tickles my taste buds. 🙂 I’m passing this recipe on to my friend who loves canning! Thanks, Bernice. 🙂
That’s kind of you. I hope she loves the recipe Sharon.
Loved this guide! My pickles are now sitting after 2-3 weeks and I can’t wait to eat them. Focusing on being patient now
It takes a little patience but the payoff is huge!!
Would this recipe also work for pickled mixed beans, carrots, onions, etc? Just a mix of them together? It looks great!
You bet! This brine is pretty versatile. I just used it last week to make dill pickles.
I find that the pickled carrots get paler as time goes by, well within the year. Is there some way to preserve the orange colour?
Hi. Did you follow this recipe exactly? I store them downstairs where it is cool and dark. I haven’t had these issues and mine are more than a year old.
After water bath canning I noticed that my vegetables are sitting above the brine. Have you had this happen? If so, please advise if they can still sir on a shelf not being completely immersed in the brine. Thank you
Hi Danette. This is a common issue when pickling. It seems that no matter how much you pack the carrots in there, they become floaters after processing. Providing your jars have sealed well, they should be fine although they may not have the same flavour as the ones totally immersed in the brine. If you are concerned, you can try flipping the jars periodically so that they all are in contact at one point or another.
I’ve used dried dill before.. the taste is good, but makes it messy.. the dill is all over the carrots.. doesnt impact the taste though!
It’s been a year since I made these and I’m down to my last 2 jars (making more for this year tomorrow!). These really get better and better as they sit. I would still recommend eating them in a year, but the flavour matured a lot over the months, so there is a benefit to patience with them. They remain crunchy too! They are also great with hot peppers if you like a little heat! (Hope your garden didn’t get crushed by the hail this summer. Calgary seems to be having it rough. We are all cringing for you from Saskatchewan).
Lori, thanks so much for your wonderful comment. I’m so glad you enjoy the Carrot Pickle recipe and are making them again this year. Happy pickling!
Can’t find flowered dill can I add dried dill
Hi Lynn, you can certainly give it a try. TBH I’ve never used dried dill so I’m not sure how it will turn out. I would add it per jar (and not directly in the brine).
How many jars does this recipe make?
Hi Cagney, recipe yields 5 pint sized jars. The quantity is marked at the very top of the recipe card.
Can you use minced garlic?
I suppose you could. Never have done it myself. Are you using it from a jar? If so, it might not be as fresh and may introduce bacteria into the pickles.
How come when I can carrots I have to use pressure canner but making pickled carrots can be processed in water bath canner?
HI Debbie. The difference is that pickled carrots have a high acidity due to the vinegar. Highly acidic foods are safely canned in a simple water bath canner while non acidic foods like plain carrots need to be processed in a pressure canner.
I want to do some dilled carrots, but not crazy about the salt for a sodium reduced diet. I am thinking they would sill be fine if I reduced the salt?
It’s up to you Kim. You can try reducing the salt to 1/3 cup, however, in pickling salt does more than heighten flavour. It also physically allows flavours to penetrate the carrots. If you do reduce the salt, keep in mind that your brine will not taste as I’ve intended in this recipe and it will take longer for your carrots to fully pickle. Just a thought, pickles by their very nature are salty. When you are eating them, you eat them with a meal or other food and you don’t eat a lot at the same time. If you do try to reduce the salt to 1/3 cup please let me know how it goes.
I’m so glad I found your site, I made beets and carrots yesterday and they look awesome. Thanks to your direction. I didn’t have any mason jars but went ahead and used large store bought pickle jars. And once we had eaten all the pickles I use these.
Is this going to be ok?
Hi Craig. Believe it or not, my mother used to do the same thing. The commercial lids do have rubber underneath and they will seal. Just keep an eye on them to make sure they stay sealed. If they turn colour or get fizzy, or have a strong odour, don’t eat them.
What size jars did you use?
Hi Laurette, I used 500 ml jars.
My garlic burst when I took the jar out of the canner, why would this be?
I don’t really understand what you mean? Your garlic burst? Feel free to send a photo via email since you can’t do it here.
are you putting raw cold carrots in the jars? I thought everything canned needed to be hot.
The jars are 250 F, the brine is boiling. I do put cold carrots in the jars as well as garlic and dill. I pack the jars quickly and set them in the boiling canner. Some people may blanche the carrots first but I never have (same with pickling cucumbers). The carrots sealed perfectly and look the same today as they did when I did this batch.
What is the best way to store these? Should they be kept in a cool area or a fridge? How long before they expire?
Hi Cody! If the lids have sealed you can store them in a cool basement or a shelf (not in direct sun). No need for a fridge until they are open. They’ll be good properly stored for a year, or more. As with all canning, if the colour changes or gets cloudy, or if there’s an odd smell then discard is best.
Although if you cut your garlic lengthwise the brine will get cloudy. If you leave the garlic clove intact, it won’t!
Interesting. I’ve never had that issue. Are you absolutely sure? Cloudy brine could result from many things.
Hi there, does this recipe also work for beets?
Hi there Savannah. I don’t use this recipe for pickled beets as I prefer them sweeter, use some pickling spice, and leave out the garlic. It’s great for beans and asparagus though!
Hi. Just double checking if it supposed to be 1/2 c salt and not tablespoon. Getting ready to make brine now. Excited!
You betcha! It’s supposed to be salty as it’s a brine.
I have quart jars , not pints. Will they have the same results as pints?
Hi Nan, the brine strength and everything else should be the same, however you need to add an extra 5 minutes for quarts (if the recipe calls for pints) Also remember processing time will be increased according to the altitude where you live. I am at over 3000 ft altitude so I process my pints 20 minutes, if I was using quarts I would process 25 minutes. At sea level it’s 10 and 15 minutes. Hope that helps. PS there’s a link in the recipe card that brings you to a page with an altitude chart.