One of my most distinct early food memories is strange, to be sure. I was on a vacation to Busch Gardens with my family, and I was feeling lousy. Maybe it was the heat or maybe it was something I ate, but I remember feeling sick for most of the morning. Eventually, my parents decided it was time to stop and get something to eat.
Needless to say, the prospect was less than appealing for me. I made my way through the cafeteria-style line and saw only one thing that I thought my stomach could handle: a whole garlic pickle. Why did I think this was a good idea? Who knows.
Whatever the reason, it turns out I was right. Not only was I able to eat the pickle, which was fresh, crisp and redolent with garlic and dill, it completely cured me! I was able to enjoy the rest of the day in the theme park, and I have always credited my recovery to that delicious garlic pickle.
Since then, I’ve gone out of my way to try all kinds of pickles whenever the opportunity has presented itself. I’ve tasted half-sours, garlic dills, kosher dills, gherkins, cornichons, bread-and-butters and new pickles. I once tried a horseradish-infused vodka martini at least in part because it was garnished with a pickle.
But now I’ve taken my love of cured cucumbers to a whole new level – I’ve finally made my own pickles. As it turns out, my favorite type of pickle (half-sour with plenty of garlic) is surprisingly easy to make at home. More images and the recipe after the jump.
As easy as they were to make, it took quite a bit of looking to find a recipe that seemed to offer just what I was looking for. After reading through numerous recipes for similar pickles, I found myself rejecting some because they had too many ingredients, others because they had too few. But when I stumbled across a recipe posted by someone known as PuterCop on GroupRecipes.com, I knew I had found my starting point.
Here’s the recipe as provided by PuterCop:
Ingredients
- 12 Kirby pickles (approximately 4″ long) (I quarter them into spears)
- Lacking kirbys use firm smaller cucumbers
- 3/4 cup pickling spice
- 6 cloves of garlic (cut in half)
- 1 cup white vinegar
- 3/4 cup kosher salt
- cold water (not chlorinated tastes yucky)
- 3 celery stalks (optional I leave it out most of the time)
- 2 roots of dill (approximately) or 1 tbl dill weed (not seed)
- BIG glass jar (about a gallon size or mix liquid and a use a bunch of small jars)
Directions
- wash pickles and celery and arrange in a jar in an upright position along with half of the pickling spice, cloves of garlic and half of the dill. Set aside.
- Mix 6 cups of cold water with kosher salt and white vinegar.
- Place in a large bowl and stir until salt is melted. The vinegar is what you need to adjust for flavor usually not the salt
- Taste. Should be sort of sour but not really salty
- Put water and salt mixture and vinegar into the jar until the mixture covers the pickles.
- Add the balance of the pickling spice and the dill.
- Seal and shake like crazy for a few seconds to blend all ingredients.
- Let this stand on the counter at room temperature, uncovered, or with the top just sitting on the jar but not closed, for one full day (24 hours).
- Check by tasting and if it is satisfactory, let it stand for an additional 2 days, uncovered. Adjust vinegar as necessary.
- . When the pickles turn dark greenish, cover and refrigerate.
- They will keep for 2 weeks in the frig… if they last that long.
- For sour tomatoes use 12 small green tomatoes, use the same ingredients above except increase the salt to 1 cup
- Tomatoes take longer to sour. Leave them on the counter for 2 days, uncovered, then cover and leave on the counter or outside for another 2 to 3 weeks.
- Tomatoes are ready when they change color from light green to dull olive green.
I purchased my cucumbers on the Farmers’ Line at Eastern Market. Though you may be tempted to go with Persian cucumbers or one of the other varieties you can frequently find at markets throughout the city, you should be sure to seek out cucumbers that lend themselves to pickling (some are even named pickling cucumbers to make it that much easier to identify them). The dill came from Eastern Market as well, though the garlic, the pickling spice and the white vinegar all came from Harris Teeter. I purchased two half-gallon jars from Michael’s Arts & Crafts, which provided me just enough space to divide the recipe into two jars.
The first time I tried to make the pickles, I followed his directions to the letter. Although the flavors were there, I found the results too salty to truly enjoy on their own (though they made a delicious relish when chopped in a food processor). So I tweaked it a bit, decreasing the salt in the recipe from 3/4 cup to 1/2 cup.
My second outing proved far more successful – the crisp texture blended perfectly with the flavors of vinegar, salt, garlic and dill, and I was able to quarter and serve the results at a picnic with friends this weekend. When a friend who shares my love for good, garlicky sour pickles offered her praises, I knew I had a winner on my hands.
I am still amazed at how easy it is to make these pickles – if you’re the kind of person who feels that no self-respecting deli should be without a barrel of brined pickles just begging to be fished out and sliced, you owe it to yourself to give these little guys a shot. The crunch and the bite of the pickles are a wonderful reward for doing it yourself, and the cost of the ingredients is still less than what you would pay in the store for a decent alternative to home-made.
August 6, 2008 at 10:51 pm
putercop was a great friend of mine and I can vouch that any recipe of his, is great. We traded recipes for many years. May god rest his soul, he is now watching me to make sure I cook them right.
September 8, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Thanks for passing on the sour pickle recipe. I think I’m done canning for the year. I will add it to my long list of things to can in 2009!
October 27, 2008 at 8:02 am
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November 24, 2008 at 10:57 am
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July 11, 2009 at 1:48 pm
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July 24, 2009 at 4:19 pm
Hi
I can’t wait to make these, thanks for the recipe! But can you please tell me about dill root? I bought a couple stems of dill with the root still attached. Is that it?
July 26, 2009 at 8:18 pm
You’ve got it, Carla. And keep an eye on this space – we’re going to be trying another batch soon and I’m eager to try putting together my own blend of pickling spices from scratch. We’ll let you know how that goes, too.
July 27, 2009 at 1:23 pm
Thanks! I made my own picklin’ spice from a combination of these two recipes:
http://whatscookingamerica.net/Q-A/PicklingSpice.htm
i think it turned out ok, pickles are in their 3rd day of room temp, i worry that there won’t be enough left after all the tasting to get to the refridge stage 🙂
August 20, 2009 at 8:39 pm
I made a few changes with awesome results:
* 12 Kirby pickles (approximately 4″ long) Leave whole and poke many holes with a
knife.
* Lacking kirbys use firm smaller cucumbers
* (Omit)3/4 cup pickling spice
* 8 cloves of garlic (cut in half)
* 2 Tbls. Turmeric
* small onion sliced in rings
* 1/2 Cup Fresh whole basil
* 3 Whole Scallions and 3 Chives
* 1 cup white vinegar
* 1/2 cup kosher salt
* cold water (not chlorinated tastes yucky)
* (Omit)3 celery stalks (optional I leave it out most of the time)
* 2 roots of dill (approximately) or 1 tbl dill weed (not seed)
* BIG glass jar (about a gallon size or mix liquid and a use a bunch of small jars)
I used my wife’s crock pot. Rinse with vinegar
and lay all the spices in the crock. lay the cukes in the crock and cover with saucer plates to weigh down when brine is poured. Put a plastic bag over crock loosely. Wait 4 days. Awesome!
August 20, 2009 at 9:20 pm
I like where you’re going with all of this – I’m definitely going to have to give your recipe a try soon. Thanks for the feedback!
August 24, 2009 at 9:55 pm
Just started a batch using your recipe, Jack (though I may have used a bit more turmeric than you called for, as I was finishing it up and didn’t measure especially meticulously.
I’ll be back with the results by the weekend!
August 27, 2009 at 7:47 am
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August 27, 2009 at 9:00 am
I started making some very similar refrigerator pickles this summer and they are a huge hit with family and friends. Sometimes I like to throw a red chili or two into the jar to add just a little heat.
August 30, 2009 at 7:50 pm
This is the
Best.
Pickle recipe.
Ever.
Thanks!
August 30, 2009 at 9:10 pm
Thanks, Lisa! Glad you liked it too!
September 16, 2009 at 7:47 am
[…] A few weeks ago, we received a comment from Jack who made a few tweaks to our favorite recipe for homemade half-sour pickles. His version added onions and turmeric to the mix, which we expected to give the pickles a more […]
December 10, 2009 at 5:49 pm
OK SEEM LIKE VERY UMM.. I’LL TRY IT.TQ
December 22, 2009 at 12:31 pm
This is one of the best pickle recipe yet. I just started a batch and i added more garlic and a little heat…i can’t stop making them and eating them.as i scribe i’m making a batch of pickled green tomato’s that i love so much as well.
Thanks.
June 3, 2010 at 3:05 pm
[…] Home-Made Pickles: Half Sour, All Awesome: I am still amazed at how easy it is to make these pickles – if you’re the kind of person who feels that no self-respecting deli should be without a barrel of brined pickles just begging to be fished out and sliced, you owe it to yourself to give these little guys a shot. The crunch and the bite of the pickles are a wonderful reward for doing it yourself, and the cost of the ingredients is still less than what you would pay in the store for a decent alternative to home-made. Found at Capital Spice. […]
July 1, 2010 at 8:27 am
I made the pickles using 1/4 cup kosher salt, and found it to be much too salty. Can amount of salt be adjusted, to say 1/2 the amount, and still come out ok?
July 20, 2010 at 1:46 pm
I’m gonna make Jacks half sours on Thrusday. I’m gonna grate the garlic into the gallon jug. Does anybody see anything wrong with that? I think it will make them more garlickie. Any sugestions?
July 20, 2010 at 3:29 pm
I think that would definitely help to increase the diffusion of the garlic within the brine. I know many commercial brands chop or dice the garlic – I’ve seen chunks at the bottom of their jars.
July 21, 2010 at 1:25 pm
Are they saying to put the root of the dill? I don’t get it, the root, the thing thats under ground?
July 21, 2010 at 1:33 pm
When I’ve made the pickles, I’ve considered everything that grows from a single taproot on up as one. So you would need two taproots with all of the stems and greenery that grew out of them for this recipe.
Hope that helps to clarify!
July 21, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Ok then, what your saying is if I have dill growing, I pull 2 of the dill out ROOTS and all, wash them off and put everything in the jug? I just don’t want to mess this up. And thanks!!
July 21, 2010 at 7:21 pm
You don’t need to worry about pulling the roots or including them…I just use the taproot as a guide to make sure I’m getting enough dill. Two roots’ worth of plant tends to work well for me. If you’re getting them from your garden feel free to cut them above the root so it can grow back.