Pickled Garlic Recipe

Episode 2 of Store Bought is here, and this one might be the easiest yet. We’re pickling garlic — bought in bulk, peeled and ready to go, the same way you’d find it at almost any grocery store or warehouse club.

Scott’s the one who handles the actual canning for this series, and he’ll be the first to tell you: pickled garlic is one of the lowest-effort, highest-reward projects in this whole lineup. A handful of ingredients, one pot, and a pantry staple that keeps for months.

A Short History of Garlic

Garlic has been part of human kitchens for a genuinely long time. Research on its history and domestication points to Central Asia as garlic’s center of origin, with its closest known wild relative found there as well. Archaeological evidence places cultivated garlic in ancient Egypt by around 3000 BCE, and it appears in early Babylonian and Assyrian records around the same period — meaning people have been growing, trading, and preserving garlic for thousands of years, across nearly every major ancient civilization.

Pickling itself is just as old a preservation method. Putting the two together — garlic and a vinegar brine — isn’t a modern trend or anyone’s invention. It’s a practical way to keep a pantry staple on hand, the same way people have for a long time.

Why Pickle Garlic

If you’ve never made pickled garlic before, it’s worth knowing it isn’t just a novelty. Pickled cloves are genuinely useful in the kitchen:

• Eat them straight out of the jar as a briny, garlicky snack
• Chop and stir into salad dressings or marinades for a milder, tangier garlic flavor than raw
• Add to a charcuterie or snack board
• Mix into salsa, stir-fries, or burgers for a little extra bite

And because this episode of Store Bought skips the peppers and extra spices, this version is about as simple and beginner-friendly as pickled garlic gets — just garlic, vinegar, water, salt, sugar, and oregano.

A Note on Safety

Garlic is a low-acid food, and plain garlic — with no vinegar involved — cannot be safely canned in a water bath canner under any circumstances. The vinegar in this recipe makes it safe to process this way: it drops the final acidity low enough to prevent botulism growth, the same principle behind the dilly beans in Episode 1.

That’s why we’re using a specific tested recipe here rather than freelancing quantities. This one comes from the Ball/Bernardin Complete Book of Home Preserving, and we’ve made one adjustment — using water in place of the wine the original recipe calls for. That’s a safe substitution: vinegar still makes up the majority of the liquid in the brine, well above the minimum threshold extension services recommend for a safe pickle, and it makes the ingredient list easier to source for anyone who doesn’t keep wine in the house.

Pickled Garlic Recipe

Yield: 5 half-pint jars. Processing time: 10 minutes (water bath), adjusted for altitude. Headspace: ½ inch

Ingredients

• 12 large garlic heads (about 1¾ lbs once separated into cloves)
• 2½ cups white vinegar (5% acidity or higher)
• 1 cup water
• 1 tablespoon canning/pickling salt
• 1 tablespoon white sugar
• 1 tablespoon dried oregano

Instructions

1. Separate the garlic heads into individual cloves and peel. To make peeling easier, blanch the cloves in rapidly boiling water for about 30 seconds, then immediately transfer them to cold water — the skins will slip right off.
2. In a non-reactive pot, combine the vinegar, water, salt, sugar, and oregano. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 1 minute.
3. Add the peeled garlic cloves to the pot and simmer for 1 more minute.
4. Pack the garlic cloves into half-pint jars, leaving ½ inch of headspace.
5. Ladle the hot pickling liquid over the garlic, maintaining ½ inch of headspace. Remove air bubbles, wipe the jar rims clean, and apply the lids.
6. Process in a water bath for 10 minutes, adjusting for your altitude. Let jars cool undisturbed for 12–24 hours, then check the seals.

A Few Notes

• Don’t be alarmed if the garlic turns blue or green in the jar. This is a harmless chemical reaction between compounds in the garlic and the acidic brine — it doesn’t mean anything has gone wrong, and the garlic is still safe to eat.
• Give it time before opening. Like most pickles, pickled garlic tastes best after sitting for at least 2–4 weeks, which gives the flavor a chance to fully develop.
• Altitude adjustments: if you’re above 1,000 feet, add 5 minutes to your processing time; above 6,000 feet, add 10 minutes.

Prefer to grow your own instead of buying in bulk? Garlic is actually one of the easier crops to grow at home, and fall is exactly when you’d plant it. Check out our guide to growing garlic in fall if that’s a path you’d rather take.

More From Store Bought

This is Episode 2 — head over to the Store Bought hub page to catch Episode 1 (Dilly Beans) if you missed it, and to see new episodes as they go live.

If you’re local, come find us at the Buffalo Gap Farmers Market — we’re always happy to talk through what’s in the jar, and why.

Sources & Further Reading

• Kingry, Judi and Lauren Devine. Ball/Bernardin Complete Book of Home Preserving. Toronto: Robert Rose, 2015, p. 313. The tested recipe this episode is based on.
• Oregon State University Extension Service — general guidance on safe pickling ratios, including the principle that vinegar should make up at least half of a pickling brine’s total liquid.
• National Center for Home Food Preservation — general guidance on using only tested recipes from reliable sources for home canning.
• History, evolution and domestication of garlic, Plant Systematics and Evolution — on garlic’s origins in Central Asia and its long history of cultivation.