2010 Dill Pickles - Slices and Spears

Last summer, I kept seeing cucumber pickles at our Farmer's Market week after week.  They weren't too terribly expensive, but I had never pickled, so I was hesitant to buy them.  After a few searches, I settled on an easy recipe for refrigerator pickles.  I made them spicy and gave away a few jars.  They were good, but they weren't really pickled using traditional methods.  The refrigerator method takes away a lot of the brining, processing, and storage time, so it was a good introduction to pickling.

This year, after finding a book at the library entitled "The Joy of Pickling", I decided to give the longer-version a try with all the boiling/processing/waiting that traditional pickling calls for.

At two markets, we purchased the pickles, garlic, and dill.  I threw in black peppercorns and red pepper flakes.  The slices were packed in pints and the spears were packed in wide-mouth quarts.

Both recipes call for a one-month storage in the root cellar (our basement!) where we can keep them cool and out of light.  We have 7 pints of slices, so if they turn out, we'll have some hostess gifts for the end of summer bbq parties we get invited to.