Pickling salt, also called canning salt or preserving salt, is a fine-grain salt with no additives. Made of pure sodium chloride, pickling salt doesn't contain the iodine and anticaking agents that are traditionally added to table salt.
Do You Need Pickling Salt?
Pickling salt is the best salt to use in canning brine because the fine grains dissolve easily and result in a clear liquid that highlights the bright, green pickles inside the jar. Using table salt in your pickle brine will result in cloudy, murky liquid because the anticaking additives are not water soluble.
Table salt won't affect the taste of the pickles, but the opaque liquid it produces isn’t visually appealing. It’s unlikely that someone will purchase your pickles if they can’t see what’s inside the jar. Pickling salt produces crystal clear brine that’s optimal for showing off your pickled cucumbers, dilly beans, and sauerkraut.
