So I am trying to figure out how to calculate the nutritional value of pickled vegetables.
Let’s say I use:
10 pounds of carrot
1 liter of vinegar
1 liter of water
250 grams of sugar.
After getting rid of the waste, how do I know how much of the sugar and vinegar is actually in the carrots?
That’s an incredibly complicated question and depends on whether you heat the solution, how long you leave it to pickle, and whether any fermentation goes on during the pickling process.
Okay, well, does it change the nutritional values a lot or is it still close to the ‘‘raw’’ carrots? Because essentially most of the additives are thrown out.
Some of the nutrition from the carrots may leak out too, though, displaced by the pickling agent. And of course, cooking and fermentation will change the carrots too (much as boiling a carrot will).
My guess would be that the nutritional value won’t change that much. Using cucumbers and pickled cukes as an example, the only real difference was a sharp spike in sodium levels between dill pickles and raw cukes, which is to be expected with the usual brine. You’ll add a bit of calories with the sugar in the brine, but that’s about it. Same fiber content (within reason), some small alteration in vitamin levels, but unless you are making these carrots 75% of your daily diet, I wouldn’t concern myself.
I am not cooking them and they won’t be pickled long enough to start fermentation.
But from the looks of it will need a lab to figure this out.
I am working on nutritional labels, that’s why I wanna be as close as possible.
Sorry, clicked Post too fast.
You might try emailing the folks at the National Center for Home Food Preservation. I suspect they won’t know the answer to your question, but they may be able to point you to someone who does.
Haha I was just about to hate on your website with recipes. 
If their is no definitive answer here I will e-mail some professionals.
Thanks for the suggestion.
After getting rid of the waste, how do I know how much of the sugar and vinegar is actually in the carrots?
The problem is that sugar is 10 times more caloric than carrots.
Only a lab analysis can give you hard data, but spit-balling the numbers can show you what you’re up against.
Sugar is 3.87 cal/gram so 250 grams is 967.5 calories. So lets get crazy and say half of that stays in the carrots. I think that’s a very high estimate, but let’s see where it gets us.
So lets say 484 calories of sugar added to 4535.92 grams of carrots or 0.11 added calories per gram of carrots, or something on the order of .75 added calories in a 1/4 oz serving. Since 7 grams of raw carrots is just under 3 calories, it works out to about a 25% increase in calories.
All you would really need is an analytical balance to figure it all out on your own. You can get a decent used one for about a grand.
How precise or accurate do your labels need to be? Do they legally have to be actual measurements of your pickled foods, or just general measurements of that type of food? You could get an idea by looking up the nutritional content of what you’re looking for, like this (just the first one I came across; there are probably better sites).
Then maybe look up said values for the brine concentration/recipe you’d use and match the info you can find from others who’ve already paid a lab to do the work?