Since the downtown farmer’s market isn’t going to be around for very much longer, I though that I should take advantage of the situation and make some more pickles before the season is over.

After doing a quick walk around to gauge the prices, I finally found a vendor that was selling 1 1/2 pint containers of pickling cucumbers for $2.00 each. Wanting to get the price even lower, I offer them $15 for 10 containers. We eventually settled on $18 for 10 containers (a $2 total discount). I have a feeling that if I had waited until noon (when the market stops) instead of when I was there at 11am, I could have gotten them for $15.

But I still got a hell of a good deal, since the two bags of cucumbers ended up weighing ~15 lbs, so at ~$1.20 lb it was still a great deal. Later on I didn’t realize how much ~15 lbs of cucumbers were until I started to process them. After getting through the first ~7 lb bag, I decided to make the pickles two different ways, fermented/brined and hot processed vinegar pickling (like v1.) Below you’ll see the recipes that I used for versions 2 and 3 of the vinegar pickles. The brined pickles (version 4) will be getting their own separate post.

Version 2.0

Brine:
(note: less vinegar & more water compared to v1)

• 3.5 cups vinegar
• 4.5 cups water
• 2 TB pickling spice mix
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup canning salt

Bring Mixture to a boil, then simmer for 15 mins.

Per quart jar add:
(note: added black peppercorns & celery seeds compared to v1)

• 2 bay leaves
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
• 1/2 tsp whole black peppercorns
• 3/4 tsp celery seed
• 2 tsp mustard seed
• 3 tsp Dill seed

Process 15 mins in a boiling water canner
Yield: 3 quart jars

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Version 3.0
I had some remaining brine from v2, so I just strained it. I then added 1.5 cups vinegar, 2.5 cups water, 4 TB white sugar, 1/4 cup of salt. This addition was just a little bit short. So I topped off the jars with a mixture of 1/4 cup vinegar & 1/4 cup water.

Brine:
(note: less vinegar & more water, also removed the pickling spice compared to v1 & v2)

• 3 cups vinegar
• 5 cups water
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup canning salt

Bring Mixture to a boil, then simmer for 15 mins.

Per quart jar add:
(note: increased the red pepper flakes to 1/2 tsp, and increased the celery seed to 1 tsp compared to v2)

• 2 bay leaves
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
• 1/2 tsp whole black peppercorns
• 1 tsp celery seed
• 2 tsp mustard seed
• 3 tsp Dill seed

Process 15 mins in a boiling water canner
Yield: 4 quart jars

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Side Notes:
1) Add the celery seeds after removing all the air from the jar with the food saver attachment. If you don’t, you’ll end up with a lot of seeds inside the attachment, instead of inside the jar.
2) One of the v3 jars doesn’t have any garlic inside, since I used up the rest of the garlic for the other three jars in v3. This was a one time problem, since I then ended up purchasing a 3 lb jug of peeled garlic.
3) Don’t over fill the jars, since it looks like with v3, I had a bit of a boil over in the canner kettle. Since the water was a little bit green after processing.