dill pickles!

this is the cheater's way of making pickles. there is no processing involved. we all think they taste MUCH better than pickles that were processed in the canner.

also, there is NO special equipment! :)

this is the book i got the recipe from. there are a bunch of good ones in here. also, for every recipe it has 4 copies of it to tear out and give to your friends.

page 16
ingredients:
3lbs - 4" cucumbers (i'm using regular ones from the grocery store, slices up)
1/2 cup - salt (as per my note to myself, i'm using less salt)
4 1/2 cups - water
1 1/2 cups - white vingegar
1/2 tsp - mustard seeds
4 heads - fresh dill (i'm using 1/2 tsp dried for each jar)
4 cloves garlic (i'm using 2 cloves of canned garlic per jar)

it says that it makes 4 pints. this recipe made 5 for me and there was enough brine left for a 6th.

get your ingredients and assistants together.

prep your jars. put them in water until it starts to simmer, then turn the stove off until you need the jars.

do the same with the lids. don't forget to put them in the pan up, down, up, down, so they don't stick together.

wash and slice your cucumbers. i washed them with soapy water to get as much of the waxy gunk off as i could. then slice off the ends. i cut them between 1/4 and 3/8 of an inch thick. we like thick pickles though. you can cut them how ever you want. i ended up cutting some in spears too.

i started by only cutting half because i didn't want to waste any cucumber that i didn't need. i cut them as i needed them to pack later.

you can use your food processor with the slicing plate for this too. they turn out way too thin for us though.

a mandolin would be good for this also because you can adjust widths. but the knife worked just find for me.

make the brine:
bring the water, vinegar, salt and mustard seeds to a boil until the salt dissolves.

take the jars out of the hot water and put the dill and garlic in each jar.

pack the jars with cucumber. now, when i say pack, i mean PACK. get as many in there as you can. just make sure you leave 1/2" to the top of the jar. try not to touch the rim of the jar.

wipe off the rim. center the hot lids on top. screw bands down to finger tip tight. turn upside down until cool.

i don't know why they tell you to turn them upside down. but i do know that i forgot to this time and only 2 of the jars sealed.

any of your jars that don't seal should be kept in the fridge.

they should be ready in a few days. ours will probably be all eaten before then. :P