More on the homemade pickles

I decided to make a longer post about the homemade pickles.  We used Ball Dill pickle mix and the recipe on the bottle.  We went with the "enjoy now" recipe.  It does not involve actually canning anything.  The pickles should last up to three months in the fridge with the "enjoy now" recipe.  (After tasting them I don't think that will be a problem.)  I plan on trying the actual canning recipe next time.  When canning the pickles they can last up to a year.  That is for another post.  This "enjoy now" recipe was super easy and if the pickles that we tried were any indication, the finished product will be delicious.

In order to make pickles you need cucumbers.  Well good thing for us we planted some in the garden.  Also luckily we just harvested some today.

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Next of course you have to make the cucumbers look like pickles.  No one would believe that they were pickles if you didn't cut them up some.  (Just kidding. I know some pickles are whole.)  We cut some of the cucumbers into small slices and some into spears.  Here is a picture of the slices.  You will see the spears in later pictures. 

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Next you have to heat the pickle mix up to boiling.  After you mix the ingredients together throw them on the stove and heat them up.  In case you don't have a bottle of the pickle mix in front of you and you are curious what goes into the mix, I'll tell you.  The Ball Pickle mix (various spices and other groovy stuff,) water, and vinegar.  I read that if you use apple cider vinegar it can cause the pickles to darken slightly. It also said that if you use clear vinegar the pickles will stay whiter and turn slightly translucent.  We used clear vinegar this time. I may try cider vinegar in the future to see if there really is a difference.

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When the mix gets up to boiling you pour it over the cut cucumbers and let the whole thing cool to room temperature.  While we were waiting for the mix to boil we had a slight emergency.  There was a dog that had gotten loose and was on the run.  Before you get too worried it wasn't one of ours, so don't fret too much.  It did however give us the perfect excuse to pour the mixture over the cucumbers and leave it there for about an hour and a half.

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Next is packing the pickles.  Before I break into a "Frank packed a peck of pickled...etc" let me say that we tried a few at this stage and they were pretty awesome.  This step is pretty basic.  Grab cucumbers and stick in jar.  Most folks will excel at this step.   Just try not to eat too many of the danged things, you need to fill the jars not you stomach.

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Ok once you have the jars packed, and you have stopped eating, ladle the pickling mix into the jars.  No matter how good the cucumbers tasted in the last step, don't be tempted to drink the pickling juice.  IT IS NOT TASTY.  Ask me how I know.......

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After the ladle comes the lid.  Seal that sucker up.  If we were canning there would be quite a few more steps.  As luck would have it we are not canning so we are done.  Here are the final pickles in their jars.

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The recipe says that the pickle will develop their best flavor in about three weeks.  We shall see.  They were pretty darn good today.