Dill pickles

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My Dad used to make the best dill pickles in a huge crock. After endless hours of searching, neither my daughter nor I have been able to find his index card among the very many my Mom had in her boxes. :(

Luckily, a friend of mine just posted on Facebook that he was starting a batch of pickles. I shared my tale of woe, and he sent me his PDF of the recipe he uses. It sounds a LOT like what I remember of Dad's!

I plan on heading to the farmers' market on Thursday to get fresh-picked cukes, Kirby if I'm lucky. IF the quart I'm making turns out, I'll gladly pass Billy's recipe along to you.
 
So the recipe I tried is
3 cups of water
2 cups of white vinegar
1/4 cup of canning salt

1 garlic clove
some fresh garden dill
1 tbsb of pickling spice

I'll taste in a month.
 
I made some similar to this. I personally didn't care for them but my kids ate them all up in no time.

Farmer Jon this has been a favorite among the members here. I personally like to eat the pickling cukes in a sandwich. A lot more flavor and no wax on the outside. And since I can't eat the skins on any veggie, I peel them first then run a fork down the outside to give the slices a pretty presentation. If I am using them in a salad, I peel them in stripes instead of the whole cuke, then use the fork. :angel:
 
Do you have to use white vinegar for making the fridge pickles? I prefer either an Asian (rice) vinegar or a cider one.

I think my ultimate favorite pickle though is the bread and butter one. Along with pickled mushrooms. Can small button mushrooms be done at the same time as the fridge cukes? In the same manner? Would I have to boil the 'shrooms first?

Am I making any sense? :angel:
 
Do you have to use white vinegar for making the fridge pickles? I prefer either an Asian (rice) vinegar or a cider one.

I think my ultimate favorite pickle though is the bread and butter one. Along with pickled mushrooms. Can small button mushrooms be done at the same time as the fridge cukes? In the same manner? Would I have to boil the 'shrooms first?

Am I making any sense? :angel:

No, you can use any kind of vinegar. I've made Szechuan pickled green beans with rice vinegar and and Mexican pickled red onions with cider vinegar.

I found this recipe for pickled mushrooms that calls for roasting them first and uses red wine vinegar: http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2014/12/pickled-mushrooms-from-bar-tartine.html

I'm sure you could use the method and change up the vinegar and flavorings if you wanted to.
 
Haven't we discussed this more than once?

I do not have recipe of just brine per se, but here is the whole recipe:


Refrigerator Pickles


Cucumbers
Garlic, 1 whole (if cloves are big you can cut them in the half)
Dill to loosely cover the bottom (divided)
Pickling Salt 2-3 table spoons (depending on your taste, I use about 2.5)
Bay Leaves 3-4
Red hot pepper flakes about a tea spoon or less. Or whole hot peppers, like chili peppers for example, 2-4
Tap Water
If you can get hold of leaves of tart cherry, black currant, or leaves of horseradish, it would be great. Those leaves make pickles stronger/crunchier. You can add any or all of them a handful would be great.

To make sure pickles are crunchy, when they are done, you have to hold the cucumbers in the cold water for few hours prior the processing. The longer-the better, changing the water every hour or 2 hours, if possible. Lately I have been leaving cucumbers in the sink overnight. I do it right in the kitchen sink. Even adding some ice, to make sure water is cold.

I use a 1 gallon jar for pickling and storage. You can divide the recipe into smaller portions, just make sure to keep the ratio of the salt to water, everything else is really arbitrary, it will be fine.

I like small to medium pickling cucumbers. Put half of the dill and garlic, and bay leaves on the bottom. If you have, add above mention leaves. Put 1 or 2 hot peppers, or pepper flakes. Fill the jar with cucumbers. Add garlic. Cover with the rest of the dill, bay leaves, and other leaves.

Dissolve salt (make sure to use pickling salt) in the cold tap water and fill the jar all the way to the top. Tighten the lid pretty tight. Put the jar in a bowl or some other container. For next few days during the fermentation, the water will be sipping thru the top. Make sure to clean that water so you know when the fermentation stops. 3-5 days depending how sour you like them, i.e. in the store you can buy half sour or sour pickles (temperature in the room really makes a difference, the hotter it is the faster is the fermentation). After that you can put them away. I have spare fridge so I keep them in the fridge the whole winter.
As the matter of fact I just opened the last gallon size jar couple of days ago.
 
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I don't have any ideas about this recipe, but I'll be watching this thread to get ideas
 
So what's the recipe?

In my 25 gal barrel I layer in grape leaves, cukes, dill, spices, garlic....then in a gal container 2/3 cup salt, 3/4 cup vinegar, fill rest of it with water, shake and pour until you cover your cukes. Cover with grape leaves. Now the hard part.....wait 3 weeks.
 
In my 25 gal barrel I layer in grape leaves, cukes, dill, spices, garlic....then in a gal container 2/3 cup salt, 3/4 cup vinegar, fill rest of it with water, shake and pour until you cover your cukes. Cover with grape leaves. Now the hard part.....wait 3 weeks.



So it’s vinegar pickles. Not dill pickles.
Thank you.
 
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