Pickled Cabbage Salad
This is a flexible recipe, you could add actual celery slices rather than the seed, red onion or a little red cabbage to create a ink pinky tangled look.
From: smittenkitchen Makes 9 to 10 cups, which shrinks to 7 to 8 cups after pickling
Brine
1 1/2 cups white vinegar
1 1/2 cups water
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon celery seed
1 tablespoon plus 2 teaspoons kosher salt* plus more to taste
Salad
1 small head (2 pounds) green cabbage
1 red bell pepper
1 carrot (I used only 1/2 my very thick one)
1 kirby cucumber
Mix brine ingredients in the bottom of a medium bowl and set aside.
Prepare your vegetables: Trim and core cabbage and slice thinly with a knife, food processor slicing blade or adjustable-blade slicer. Place in a large bowl. Core, seed and thinly slice red pepper; peel and thinly slice or julienne carrot; thinly slice cucumber (I quartered mine first). Add vegetables to cabbage bowl.
By the time you’re done preparing your vegetables, the sugar and salt should in the pickling mixture should dissolved. If not, whisk a few times until they do. Taste and adjust if you’d like it a little saltier — I added 1 more teaspoon of kosher salt in the end.
Pour pickling brine over vegetables and cover bowl with a lid or plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 1 hour or up to 1 week. Salad becomes more pickled as it rests. Eat with everything.
* Not all salts are weighted equally: Read more here. I used Morton brand, which for 1 tablespoon plus 2 teaspoons clocks in at 24 grams. If using table or fine sea salt, use only 4 teaspoons.