How to Make (and can!) Pickles

The first project I described on this blog was how to make pickles. This has proven to be one of my most popular articles. A year has since come and gone so the time has come again to preserve the summer harvest for the lean months to come. This time of year you'll find an abundance of pickling cucumbers also known as "kirbys" or "cukes" at farmers markets and roadside stands. You can also easily grow them yourself, something I didn't do this year in my New York City garden, but I'm tempted to next year! I also decided to pickle some green beans. I did everything the same as for the pickles, but did not add pickling spice.
I got my cukes at a farmers market in Vermont over the Labor Day weekend. I filled a five gallon pail for $20!
This year I decided to take my pickling to the next level and preserve the pickles in Ball jars. The salt and vinegar act as a natural preservative so you can make pickles in regular sterilized glass jars and keep them in the refrigerator, which is what I did last year. But pressure canning allows you to store the pickles at room temperature for up to a year without worry about spoliation. Until the advent of refrigeration, pickling was an important way to preserve food for the cold weather months. Pickling also imparts a unique flavor characteristic and has developed into its own food type above and beyond the historical necessity. For this project you will need pickling spice, pickling salt, vinegar and a few big pots. Optional equipment includes a plastic tube, dill (for dill pickles) and tongs to pick up hot jars. Pickling salt is simply pure salt with nothing added. Don't use the kind with iodine or anti-caking agents as they will cloud the pickling brine. Use sea salt, pickling salt or sea water if acceptably pure.

You will also need ball jars. You can buy these new from most grocery stores for about $9 a dozen. The jars last forever but you do need to replace the lids with each use to ensure a good seal on the jar. You can also save some old jars from the grocery store that are Ball or Kerr brand. Wide mouth quart jars work best for pickles.

Start by boiling the jars. This isn't so much for sterilization but because adding hot brine to the jars may crack them. When hot, arrange the cukes in the jars so as to get as many cukes in each jar as possible but with no cuke above the lid of the jar. If you're concerned about using jars as efficiently as possible, you can slice the cukes into quarters to save space. I've also read that you should slice off 1/16^th of an inch from the blossom end of the cuke (opposite the stem) as the blossom has an enzyme that promotes mushy pickles. I've never done this nor have I noticed this on commercial pickles, but some pickle recipes recommend it.

Some recipes also recommend soaking the pickles in brine for a few days. I believe this allows natural enzymes in the cuke to develop and increase the acidity of the pickle. This step can be skipped if using strong vinegar.
Next add a spoonful of pickling spice to each jar along with dill or garlic if desired.
On the stove, heat white vinegar, water and salt on the stove. I've seen varying ratios of vinegar to water to salt. On the low end its 1 quart vinegar to three quarts water to 1/6^th cup salt. On the higher end its closer to a 50-50 vinegar-water split. Note that I don't add the pickling spice to the pickling brine at this point because I find that its harder to get the exact amount of spice into each jar if you don't add it individually. I also prefer to siphon the boiling brine into the jars rather than ladle it and the spice will clog the siphoning tube. It's much easier to move the hot liquid by a siphon- no spilling, wasting or burning yourself. Plus it's faster when filling a lot of jars!

Fill the jars to ¼" from the rim and set aside. Dip the lids on hot water for a few moments, wipe the rim clean and place on the jar. Secure with the screw bands that came with the jars.

Next you need to boil the jars. If you don't have specialized canning equipment, you can boil the jars in a large pot with a steamer or colander in the bottom to prevent the jars from touching the bottom of the pot. Make sure the water if one inch above the lid of the jar. Boil for 20 minutes (longer with altitude) and set aside to cool. Note that you need to boil longer (as opposed to when making jam) because the cukes inside are uncooked so it will take longer for the jar to get hot enough to kill all the bacteria.
The lids of the jars will pop in when cooled indicating that you have a good seal. Pickles will keep for about a year. They're far superior to store bought and are a great gift for friends! I made the equivilent of about 12 jars of pickles for about $22 in ingredients, not counting the jars which I will reuse next year.