fifteenth - how to make pickled cucumbers

We're officially in the middle of a cucumber glut!

A crate a day. All you can eat; straight off the vine, in salads, and sandwiches, and dips and like apples. We're filling the baskets of anyone passing through. And it's still early in the season!

We planted cucumbers last year for the first time and I fell in love. I had one plant and I think I squealed in delight every single time I picked a fruit from its vine. They were so crunchy and delicious and so user friendly.

This year I planted trays and trays of seeds. And when their green leaves poked out of the soil I quickly repotted them to give their roots space until they took up half of the green house. They were a hardy plant and seemed to thrive under cover.

When it came time to plant them in the ground my farmer boy read me a section from Steve Solomon's Growing Vegetables South Of Australia;

Unless you intend to put up enough cucumber pickles to supply all the rellies, neighbours and friends, two vines will almost certainly become one vine too many.

And then I promptly ignored him and planted about 50 plants. Yep, I know.

So right now, we're getting through them, only just, but come next week, or into February - who knows.

Originally I found our pickle recipe on my instagram friend Jules @procrasticraft's page . We've made them so many times over the past few weeks that they've become a kitchen staple. They're super simple to make and ridiculously delicious to eat.

I asked Jules and she kindly gave me permission to share her recipe, so here it is. Just keep in mind that the measurements aren't exact and each time I make them the number of jars I fill changes.

PICKLED CUCUMBERS

Gather

• five medium sized jars - sterilised
• enough cucumbers to stuff the jars full
• fresh bay leaves
• 1tsp each per jar cumin, coriander, mustard seeds
• 4 cups cider vinegar
• 2 cup water
• 3Tbs each sugar and iodised salt

Make

To each jar add 2 fresh bay leaves, and 1tsp each of cumin, coriander and mustard seeds and then your cucumbers.

In a saucepan put the cider vinegar, water, sugar and salt.

Heat until the sugar and the salt have dissolved but do not bring to the boil.

Cool slightly, fill each jar, seal and store.

Leave a day or two and then EAT!

I have no idea how long they'll last but given that they are full of vinegar, sugar and salt, I'd say quite some time. Also we refrigerate the jars after we open them.

Modifications

We're not big on cumin so we ditched it.
We have masses of garlic so we peel and slice a couple of cloves per jar.
We tried pepper corns but they didn't seem to do anything for the flavour.
We haven't tried dill yet because we don't have any but are going to grow some to add.
We cut down on the sugar for taste.

You know what else? I think there's no reason why this recipe wouldn't work as a pickler for all manner of things...beetroot, onions, carrots...

The only thing that I can't work out is if it's possible to reuse the liquid in another batch, it seems like such a waste to chuck it in the compost. Do you know?

So are you in a pickle?
Do you have a go-to recipe?
What are your fave things to pickle?
Do you think you'll try these?

Thanks Jules!

Happy pickling you guys

Love Kate

xoxo