No dill :( GARLIC jar pickles

There was a nice convergence in our house last week of me reading Dad's post about pickles (particularly the part about making slices out of the larger cukes), receiving more cucumbers in our CSA box than we could hope to eat in a week, and needing something to do with Will over the weekend while Aleks worked.  All I had to do was find some grape leaves.  Unfortunately, that stymied me.  However, I recently made a cucumber salad recipe from Epicurious.com that involved tossing cucumber slices with salt, letting them sit in a colendar for ~15 min, and then squeezing out excess water and rinsing them.  I remembered being pleasantly surprised at how crispy the cukes were even after several days in the dressing.  I wondered if I could apply the same technique as a pre-treatment to making pickles in lieu of grape leaves to keep the pickles crisp.

Will and I got out our slicer on Sunday and sliced two quart mason jars worth of cukes (I think we had about 2-3 pounds).  We also had a few smaller cukes that I cut into spears and put into a half-pint jelly jar.  I don't have a garden with dill growing in it, and I forgot to buy dill at the store, so unfortunately, that got left out.  I did however have garlic on hand, and like I always do, I used it.  A lot of it. I made 1/2 recipe of brine, which was plenty.  I also somewhat randomly through a few mustard seeds into one of the jars, figuring that maybe we would want some flavor since I didn't have any dill.

Here's Will, who got dressed up for the occasion, ladling the brine into our jars.

I'm happy to report that as of today (Wed) we have some pretty decent, if somewhat over-garlicky, reasonably crisp pickles!  Even the spears turned out well.  I'm going to leave them out on the counter for 1 more day, then throw them in the fridge.  Next time, and given that we just got another pile of cukes in our CSA box there is likely to be a next time, I'm going to try to remember the dill.

I think that if you're lacking grape leaves, this method is a reasonable substitute:

Slice 1 lb of cucumbers (I sliced them to 3/8" thick), then toss slices with 1 t salt.  Let stand for ~15 min, rinse under cold water, and then squeeze to remove excess water.  Proceed according to Dad's instructions.

Also, I liked doing this in a mason jar.  We filled the jar right up to the top, then put a lid on.  While the contents weren't sterile, the jars actually sealed as the brine cooled, and the lid was in direct contact with the brine, minimizing the risk of contamination.

Thanks for the inspiration, Dad!

-Maggie