remember like forever ago when i teased y’all with my SO EASY homemade refrigerator pickle recipe. well like one million days later here it is. (I’ve just been all about the felt crafts + getting ready for my first year teaching kindergarten in the fall and have not wanted to sit down even for the 9 minutes it’ll take to write this post. so that’s what the hold up was all about)

anyway, pickle time !!

1. first you’ll need baby “pickling” cucumbers. not the big daddy ones from the reg grocery store. I got these at canino’s farmer market on airline. I forgot how much they were, but remember at the time being like, wow they’re are so cheap. first i scrubbed and washed them. then i gave them an ice bath before they got cut up and crammed into jars.

        2. this might be more like step one and can be done before the ice bath, anyway cut the butts                   off. the stems make for a non-ideal pickling situation.

3. here are the hodgepodge of jars i scrounged from my kitchen. since they’re “refrigerator”                    pickles and not going through the real canning process it doesn’t really matter what kind of               glass jars you use.

4. the only other important/main things you’ll need – besides the cucumbers themselves are                  “canning/ pickling” salt and not-houston-tap water. that box of morton salt was SUPER cheap at HEB. regular table salt has anti-caking agents that can make the water/salt brine cloudy, so you need this special kind. ALSO i used regular tap water (you don’t really love houston unless you drink tap water) that had been left out for 24+ hours. this is the same thing i do for kombucha and it’s worked fine for me for years – otherwise feel free to buy i don’t know – fancy water from the store.

okay so to make the brine, I used 1 Tablespoon of fancy salt to 1 cup of fancy water. supposedly if you’re doing bigger batches you can ease up on the salt a little BUT it was just easier for me to make this ratio again and again. so yep.

5. i got a little fancy and used a potato peeler to peel stripes of cucumber skin off before cutting            them into 1/2 inch disks / coins / heck, pickle shaped rounds. please say you know what i’m                talking about.

6. last thing to do before stuffing in the cucumber pieces, i placed some peeled whole garlic                     cloves and fresh dill in the bottom of the jar. this will add flavor to the cucumbers + salt +                   water.

7. super last step is to stuff those babies into the jars. it’s best, i’ve found, to do this is a semi         ordered fashion otherwise you’ll get huge gaps which isn’t the end of the world but you know,         why have less pickles in a jar when you could have more.

do the good ole “turn it upside down and see if they all stay crammed in there”test. if they                    don’t, rearrange. then fill the jars up with the salt/water brine. you want to make sure ALL the            cucumbers are covered – any part of them above the surface is likely to mold.

Then screw the lids on and leave them on your counter (out of direct sunlight) to start the                    fermentation process. you’ll want to burp them (open the jars to relieve the pressure) at least              twice a day. after a day or two, depending on how warm your house is, give them a taste and if            you’re happy with them you can place the jars in your refrigerator where the fermentation                  process will slow down drastically. If not, leave them out another day or two, continuing to                  burp them often.

how easy is that ? they’ll last in your (or your friend’s refrigerator if you decide to give them as a gift) for quite a while. so what are you waiting for, although actually now that i think  about it, maybe cucumber season it already over for texas. yikes. anyway this method is literally the easiest thing EVER and heck, no cucumbers – why not use something you do have like green beans or radishes.

let me know if you end up making any of these or if you’re my friend in real life i still have a                 bunch of jars in my fridge i’d love to share with ya !!