Momofuku vinegar pickles

Starting with the recipe for Momofuku's vinegar pickles, I gathered just under 3 pounds of veggies and two Mason jars.  I used purple top turnips, watermelon radishes, daikon radishes, and different types of carrots.

Prep the veggies and pack them into the jars.

I used a mix of cuts to give the pickles some variety.

Pack the cut veggies into the two jars.  It's hard to see in the photo, but these jars have the Liberty Bell on them, special for the Bicentennial in 1976.  They used to be my grandmother's.

Make the brine.  For each jar, you'll need 1 cup of very hot tap water, 1/2 cup of rice wine vinegar, 6 tablespoons of sugar, and 2 1/4 teaspoons of kosher salt.  Put the sugar and salt into a mixing bowl, then add the cup of hot water.  Mix until the sugar and salt dissolves.  Then add the rice wine vinegar.  (Of course, you could make a single jar, in which case you'd just need to make the brine once.  Or you could double it, to make it all at once, but then you'd miss the opportunity to experiment with spices.)

The recipe said that you could optionally add coriander seeds, but I didn't have any.  I decided to try two different versions.

The one on the left has 1 teaspoon of yellow mustard seeds, 1/4 teaspoon of hot pepper flakes and 1/2 teaspoon of fennel seeds.  The one on the right omits the fennel seeds, but still has 1 teaspoon of yellow mustard seeds and 1/4 teaspoon of hot pepper flakes.  In four days, we'll have a taste test.  (Stay tuned....)