Pintest MacGyver - Bread and Butter Pickles

Everyone reaction to my first try with dill pickles was pretty much, "those pickles are huge!" *Sigh* Thanks.

I still had the canning bug so I went back to the store the next day to get more organic cucumbers.

This pintest came via this pin and the information here.

Beware: when I got started I didn't realize how many things I was out of that I still needed and had to MacGyver the situation and hope for the best.

I started off knowing the recipe called for pickling spice and I didn't have any. I can feel a little wary of purchasing this sort of thing, it makes me feel like I'm buying taco seasoning and fills me with silica related fear. Google came up with this pretty acceptable recipe of how you make your own pickling spice.

2 tablespoons mustard seeds
2 tablespoons whole allspice
2 teaspoons coriander seeds
2 teaspoons whole cloves
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon dried red pepper flakes
1 bay leaf, crumbled
1 cinnamon stick (2 inches)

Simple enough right? Not for me when I found I was out of mustard seeds, had no allspice of any sort, had ground cloves instead of whole, my bay leaves were already crumbled, and I don't think I've actually ever owned red pepper flakes.

It was substitution and conversion time.

Substituting mustard seeds: 1 teaspoon of dried mustard is equal to 1 teaspoon of prepared mustard. I didn't have dried mustard. But I did have prepared mustard! To convert mustard seeds to dried mustard, 1 tablespoon of prepared mustard can be substituted for 1 teaspoon of dried mustard.

I needed 2 tablespoons of mustard seeds and ended up just using 2 tablespoons of prepared, plain, yellow mustard.

To make your own allspice: mix equal parts nutmeg, cinnamon, and cloves. This nearly got hairy when I thought I was also out of nutmeg :O

If you only have ground cloves and not whole: 1 tsp whole cloves = 3/4 tsp ground cloves. I chose to just eyeball this one because my measuring cups and spoons have been disappearing.

Don't have red pepper flakes? I used half the amount called for in cayenne pepper.


2-1/2 cups granulated sugar As it turned out I had enough sugar but not enough of other things. At first I put in 1 1/4 cups but then I found out I didn't have enough apple cider vinegar so I took out 3 or 4 1/8cups.
2 cups cider vinegar (5% acidity) I only had 1/2 cup and wasn't making as many as the recipe called for
1 cup water I used 1/4 cup
1 tsp salt Completely forgot the salt because I was so frazzled
1 tsp celery seed Didn't have any and just abandoned all hope
1 Tbsp mustard seed Didn't feel compelled to add extra
1-1/2 Tbsp mixed pickling spice I think I ended up using 1/2 tbsp of my own mix
(cinnamon stick, ginger, mustard seeds, cloves, peppercorns, chilies, etc.)
3-1/2 pounds cucumbers, cut into 1/4″ slices I cut up 2 cucumbers

So as you can see I was going to be throwing absolute skin to the wind and seeing what on earth I ended up with.


In a 5-quart pot (non-aluminum) I have no idea what size the pot I used was, the one I wanted to use was dirty, combine sugar, vinegar, water and spices. Bring to a boil, stirring to dissolve sugar. Add cucumber slices. 

Return to a boil, stirring gently and trying to submerge slices as they cook. I had so little brine they really weren't able to submerge at all.  

When the pot returns to a boil, boil for 90 seconds, then remove from heat. The slices should have changed from a bright cucumber green to a darker pickle green. Using tongs or a slotted spoon, fill hot jars with pickles slices, then fill each with pickling liquid, leaving 1/8″ head space. (You may have extra brine; you can refrigerate this up to a week if you are making another batch soon.) Wipe rims clean with a damp paper cloth and add lids and rings. Process in a boiling water bath — 20 minutes for quarts, 10 minutes for pints. Begin timing when the water has returned to a boil after you submerge your jars.

I used an old Claussen jar. My pickles looked nothing like the one from the pin but smelled like bread and butter pickles should. The slightly puffy top of the jar freaked me out so I ran out of the kitchen and hoped nothing exploded.

I wasn't having a great day that day and an explosion felt entirely possible.

Having no idea when these were considered edible I decided to wait for one of the following things:
1) It really did explode and I had to clean it up
2) I felt ready to try out what MIGHT be terrible

Making Fridge Pickles

We ran out of pickles. We'd have two jars in there. One jar had sweet minis (or something like that) and the other were sliced Claussen (again, or something like that). I had decided that once I was out of pickles I would just make my own because I really love knowing exactly what's in our food.

I have quite a few pins about making your own pickles but opted to use this one for the time being and the information found here at its source.

I went to the grocery store and picked up some organic cucumbers.

When I came home I soaked them in a 1:4 ratio of white vinegar and water to try to get any nastiness they may have encountered off of them and also to help them last even longer if I found myself without the time to make them that same day.

After an hour of soaking in that I rubbed the cucumbers all over with my hand, dumped out the water, and then cracked a tray of ice over top of the cucumbers and added water.

I did this with the intention of letting them soak in ice water for 4 hours to help make sure I had nice, crispy pickles.

Wanting to make sure the water stayed pretty frequently "iced" I came back from time to time to freshen up the ice situation in the bowl I was keeping the cucumbers in.

Then, I washed them with my Fit wash just to try to make sure they were good and clean.

Before I set to work I made sure to once again sterilize my jars. Now when you sterilize a jar and then put something in it you really should put the item into the jar as soon as you can after removing the jar from the hot water. Not wanting to crack my jars because I was soon going to be putting something less than boiling hot into it I let them sit while I worked. This was all really more a matter of me wanting them clean. They were already clean but they'd been sitting about so this is what made me feel best.

Cut off each end of your cucumber. Compost these later.

Then prick each cucumber 3 - 4 times with either a corn skewer or a fork their cans.

 My cucumbers were a pretty decent size as you can see so I just cut them all in half and hoped for the best when it came time to put them in their jars.

Each jar that will eventually be holding your cucumbers will need, a few peppercorns, 1 - 2 sprigs of dill,

and a sliced glove of garlic.

Four jars was just my estimate at how many I was going to need for this.

Here's an attempt at a close-up of the inside of one of the jars.

Pack the cucumber in as tightly as you can. They really don't need a lot of head room.

Now to make your brine; you will need 3 cups of vinegar, 9 cups of water, and 3/4 cup of kosher salt.

Bring this mix to a boil until the salt has dissolved.

Ladle your hot brine over the cucumbers, try to get any air bubbles out of there,

seal, and place in a water bath for 7 minutes.

When you took them out they didn't look a bit cloudy.

After a few days they should begin to look like pickles.

Now let this all sit for at least a month, you want to make sure the brine has gotten a sufficient chance to really do its job.

I intend to spend my month eyeballing them and wondering what terrific taste might possibly lay in store for me if I just continue to be patient.

Pickled Red Cabbage

Who would have known that by making some pickled Vietnamese vegetables that I would have found myself bitten by the pickling bug? The only answer I can come up for this is, those of you who have or do pickle or can things knew it.

I did what I could to find a recipe that called for sea salt instead of kosher (because I ran out of kosher salt). I decided to settle on this one.

First, I mixed up the apple cider vinegar, sugar, sea salt (I told you I was out of kosher salt) and let it sit.

I cut my red cabbage in half

and washed it in a bowl once everything was cut how I wanted it.

I stuffed as much of the red cabbage as I dared into the jar I had available.

And poured the liquid over it.

I didn't shake it up every fifteen minutes on the dot or anything, I just periodically went into the kitchen and shook up the jar while I let it sit out on the counter. Here's what it looked like when I put it in the fridge for the night.

I had red cabbage left from the half that I'd cut up so I put it in a container to be used for a roasted red pepper and red cabbage salad for lunch during a planned play date for the next day.

For the moment I'm just waiting to crack into my pickled red cabbage.

Pintesting In The Kitchen - Vietnamese Pickled Vegetables

This was another one of those pins that when I saw it I felt like I just had to have it as soon as humanly possible. The recipe for these beautiful pickled vegetables can be found here.

On grocery day the first place I went for vegetables didn't have daikon, but absolutely insistant on pickled vegetables, I bought some parsnips just in absolute case I didn't find any.

Parsnips and daikon are not the same thing, but I was just feeling obsessed with getting some delicious pickled vegetables into my tummy.

Thankfully I was able to find daikon at another store.

I worked pretty slowly on this whole thing. In fact I started this while I was making that caramelized onion, mushroom, prosciutto, and  fresh mozzarella sandwich I made the other day. While I waited for my sandwich to cook I cleaned, peeled, julienned, and placed the daikon into a container for later.

When I came back I did the same to my carrots.

Some time during the cleaning and cutting of my cucumber I realized that I wasn't still back in culinary school and there wouldn't be a chef to come around and check my trimmings and julienned veggies to see if they were done to an exact standard.

I used actual paper towels to pat the cucumber dry. I'd like to point out that I did not purchase these paper towels. They were left at my house by a maintenance worker.

I also patted the previously refrigerated daikon dry. The carrots really didn't seem like they needed it to me.

Then I put together the mixure of sea salt, sugar, water, and rice vinegar. I strirred the mixture until the sugar had dissolved.

By the time I poured the liquid over the vegetables I was already salivating just a bit.

Now I have to wait five whole days!