We ordered so many cucumbers our friends were worried about us
With recipes from Joy of Cooking!
A few things happen when you order a bushel of cucumbers.
The first is that you’ll question your ambition. Pickle making is a process involving time, equipment, money, and preparation. A good recipe is essential (we recommend those from Joy of Cooking), as are good ingredients. If, like us, you’re ambitious and order an astronomical amount of cucumbers, it can be…daunting.
Secondly, you’ll question your commitment to the project. Cucumbers, when they don’t come from a typical grocery store, aren’t particularly clean. They grow on a vine, on the ground (in the dirt!!), and a simple rinse won’t necessarily wash off the grime. Each one will need to be washed and inspected for damage.
If you’re like me, this task will be repetitive enough that you’ll start looking for ways to keep yourself occupied, which is how the Tower of Kirbys came to be. Of course, once you have constructed the Tower of Kirbys you will inevitably discover that it’s inconveniently placed, and you’ll then need to move the Tower of Kirbys. But, because you’re too lazy to disassemble the Tower and then reassemble it elsewhere, you’ll have to pick up the sheet pan on which the tower is built and move it as cautiously as possible, lest you release a tidal wave of organic vermillion oblongs, an act which ends with shattered cucumber fragments all over your floor. (Thankfully, I was able to move ours without incident.) Please note that my own Tower is two rows deep, and only represents around 60% of the total volume of cucumbers we ordered.
The third thing that happens is your friends are unambiguously judgmental and unsupportive. “That’s too many cucumbers,” a text from California says. From Nashville, an editor replies to my cucumber photos with the question, “Are you opening a pickle shop? This feels like … a lot.” I don’t need this kind of negativity in my life, and my friend in California will receive no pickles. The editor in Nashville will, because she is an editor, and I am a freelancer, and home cooked food does not have a monetary value, and thus cannot technically be considered a bribe. (#Journalism.) Plus, truthfully, we traveled together and I like her enough to give her pickles regardless. Plus, she’s not my assigning editor.
Additional questions arrived in predictable enough fashion. Where would we store all of our pickles? Are we planning to eat them ourselves, or give them away? And…why?
A bushel, it turns out, is not a standardized unit of measurement. While a bushel of dried apples weighs a mere 24 pounds (10.89 kilos), one of unshucked corn weighs nearly three times as much, a whopping 70 pounds (31.75 kilos). Compared to that, a bushel of cucumbers, clocking in at 48 pounds (21.77 kilos), seems like an almost reasonable volume.
This is, of course, a lie. We received over 50 pounds of cucumbers and that’s a fucking ton of cucumbers. Ours arrived in a large, flimsy wire-and-plywood box that sat, hulking, in our dining area, like a crate from a Looney Toons cartoon that contained some kind of violent, sleeping animal, just waiting to rip its way out of its cheaply constructed prison. It was also, by the way, far too many cucumbers to fit in our NYC apartment-sized fridge, so they remained out and on the floor for a solid 24 hours.
The project began, in earnest, on Saturday. We prepped our own pickling spice (which you can just buy, but why would we ever make things easier for ourselves?), trimmed a quarter-inch from the blossom end from the washed cukes (it contains an enzyme that will make your pickles mushy in the jar), cut 15 pounds into slices and 40ish pounds into spears, peeled garlic, sliced onions, washed fresh dill, and sterilized our jars. Brine was prepared in huge batches, making our entire apartment smell like vinegar, garlic, and spices. I was sad to learn we did not make the entire floor smell like vinegar because, as you all know, it’s not really a NYC apartment building if the entire floor doesn’t smell intensely like someone’s cooking project.
Saturday was supposed to be the pickle day, but it ended up being a pickle day because I committed the number one most egregious recipe sin possible, and didn’t read the recipes all the way through before I started cooking. My wife, Andrea, filled jars with spices while I packed them with cucumber spears, garlic, and fresh dill. Our dill pickles ready (minus the brine), we moved on to prepping the bread and butter pickles, only to discover they need to sit in salt for 4-12 hours…which we had not done. Confronted by my failure, we completed the dill pickle project, salted the remaining pickle chips and sliced onions before going to bed, and Sunday morning found us ladling hot slices of cucumbers and onion into jars which we topped off with a turmeric-stained brine. We stained all of our white spatulas permanently yellow, and have likely done the same to a large cambro which we used to hold the brine.
All told we made 26 quart jars of dill pickle spears, and 17 pint jars of bread and butter pickle chips.
Making pickles can be as hard as you want it to be. Fridge pickles—where you take a vegetable, stick it in brine (either vinegar, salted/sugared water, or a mix), add in some seasonings, and let it hang out in the fridge—is as simple as it gets, with results that are edible within 24 hours.
Things get harder if you want to make properly canned pickles, which are preserved using sterilized jars, brine with an appropriate level of pH and salinity, and a hot water bath. While it’s easy to be creative with pickle making, throw off your pH levels by improvising too much and you can end up creating an environment ripe for bacteria like botulism. This is something The New York Times discovered recently when author Cathy Barrow pointed out that their recently published recipe for do-it-yourself pomodoro didn’t include nearly enough acid (the problem has since been corrected).
For those who aren’t already pickle champs, it’s good to follow a recipe from someone who knows what they’re doing. For us that meant turning to The Joy of Cooking, who not only have multiple generations of knowledge to fall back on, but also guidelines set forth by the USDA (U.S. Department of Agriculture).
The following recipes are reprinted with permission from John Becker and Megan Scott, the two dynamos responsible for the most recent edition of Joy. It’s a good book, and bulky, making it both an excellent reference source and a good hand held weapon for when our country completely collapses and pickles aren’t just a hobby, but a form of currency.
We are also including our own recipe for pickling spice. While it’s undoubtedly easier just to buy the spice pre-mixed, without question you’ll end up with dirty sweatshop spices (this is a thing I’ll write about in the future) and the quality will be poor, while the price will be high. Buy spices from good sources (like Burlap and Barrel!) and make your own blend.
NOTES
John, who clipped these recipes for me, also included notes about water-bath canning (the most common, and easiest, method), low temperature canning, and proper storage of pickles. We used the low temperature canning method, which is approved by the USDA and involves using an immersion circulator, which is the device used for at-home sous vide cooking.
Immersion circulators are precise, but do allow for some variation of temperature. Since the safety range is between 180-185 degrees Fahrenheit, we set ours at 183 F. Do note though that, if you use this method, when you put your jars into the water the temperature will drop and it will take a not insignificant amount of time for it to come back to the desired temperature. Make sure that you start your timer once the temperature is back in the required range, and not before.
If you are concerned about how long it’s taking for the water to reach the required temperature, try topping off your pot with boiling water from a kettle. It won’t make a huge difference, but it will help. You can also help the water come to temperature faster by covering your cooking vessel with aluminum foil, forming a lid around the immersion circulator. This is assuming that you don’t own one of those cambros with the lids designed to accommodate a circulator. If you do, proceed on, fancypants.
PANDEMIC KITCHEN PICKLING SPICE MIX
Yield: one teaspoon (plus a whole bayleaf)
NOTE: this recipe makes enough spice mix for one pint jar of pickles. Scale up or down depending on how many pints of pickles you intend to make. For one quart jar, double this recipe (there are two pints in one quart).
1/4 teaspoon yellow mustard seeds
1/4 teaspoon whole coriander
1/4 teaspoon dried red pepper flakes
2 whole allspice berries
2 whole cloves
1 whole bay leaf
Place spices into the bottom of a sterilized pint jar. Fill with other ingredients and process as directed by your chosen recipe.
DILL PICKLES (From Joy of Cooking)
About 6 pint jars
Prepare a water-bath canner, or prepare a water bath for low-temperature canning (see below). Gather all your canning equipment and sterilize 6 pint jars by placing them in boiling water for 10 minutes. Thoroughly wash the jar lids and rings.
Wash, then cut an 1/8-inch slice from the blossom end of:
4 pounds 4-inch-long pickling cucumbers
Halve the cucumbers lengthwise. (Cut longer cucumbers into 4-inch pieces.) Place in each jar:
1 garlic clove, peeled and smashed (6 total)
1 teaspoon dill seeds (2 tablespoons total)
1 teaspoon pickling spice (2 tablespoons total)
6 black peppercorns (36 total)
1 sprig dill (6 total)
Tightly pack the cucumbers into the jars. Combine in a medium saucepan and bring just to a boil, stirring until the salt is dissolved:
3 cups cider vinegar
2 1/4 cups water
1/4 cup pickling salt
Ladle into the prepared jars, leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Run a long thin spatula or chopstick down between the inside of the jar and the cucumbers, changing the position of the contents enough to release any trapped air. (Adjust the liquid level if needed.) Wipe the rims. Place lids on jars and screw on rings until fingertip-tight. Process for 10 minutes in boiling water, or 30 minutes if using a low-temperature water bath (see below). Let cool completely and store as directed, 923.
BREAD-AND-BUTTER PICKLES (From Joy of Cooking)
About 5 pint jars
These likely owe their appealing name to an enterprising Illinois couple who, during lean times, bartered their home-canned sweet-and-sour cucumber pickles for staples at the local grocery.
Wash, then cut an 1/8-inch slice from the blossom end of:
2 1/2 pounds pickling cucumbers
Cut into 1/4-inch-thick slices. Peel and cut into 1/4-inch-thick slices:
1 pound onions
Combine the cucumber and onion slices in a large bowl and toss well with:
3 1/2 tablespoons pickling salt
Cover with a towel, scatter a layer of ice cubes over the towel, and refrigerate for at least 4 and for up to 12 hours. Transfer the vegetables to a colander, rinse under cold water, and drain well. Prepare a water-bath canner, or prepare a water bath for low-temperature canning (see below). Gather all your canning equipment and sterilize 5 pint jars by placing them in boiling water for 10 minutes. Thoroughly wash the jar lids and rings.
Combine in a large pot:
3 cups distilled white vinegar
3 cups sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons mustard seeds
(1 1/2 teaspoons red pepper flakes)
1 teaspoon celery seeds
1 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
Bring to a boil, stirring until the sugar is dissolved. Add the vegetables, stir to mix, and heat until the syrup just begins to boil. With a slotted spoon, pack the hot slices into the prepared jars and add the hot brine, leaving 1/2 inch headspace. Run a long thin spatula or chopstick down between the inside of the jar and the cucumbers, changing the position of the contents enough to release any trapped air. (Adjust the liquid level if needed.) Wipe the rims. Place lids on jars and screw on rings until fingertip-tight. Process for 10 minutes in boiling water, or 30 minutes if using a low-temperature water bath (see below). Let cool completely and store as directed (see below).
WATER-BATH CANNING
The boiling-water method is used for high-acid fruits, fruit preserves, and pickled vegetables. Unless your canner has a jar rack that will securely hold the jars, place a rack in the bottom of the canner to keep the jars from touching the pot or each other. Fill the canner halfway with hot water and bring to a boil over high heat. Have a kettle of boiling water on hand to top off the canner once the jars are loaded. Lower the filled and capped jars onto the rack in the canner, allowing space for the boiling water to circulate between the jars. Add or remove boiling water so the level is at least 1 inch above the jars. Once the water has returned to a rolling boil, set a timer for the required processing time. Check the water level periodically, and keep a kettle of boiling water handy in case the water falls below 1 inch above the jars.
LOW-TEMPERATURE CANNING
This method was recently approved by the USDA for pickling cucumbers and gives especially crisp results. Only use this method when a recipe indicates, and never use it for low-acid or nonacid foods. Place filled jars in a canner filled halfway with warm (140°F) water, then add enough hot water to bring the level 1 inch above the jars. Heat the water to 180° to 185°F and maintain this temperature for 30 minutes. Do not allow the heat to exceed 185°F or fall below 180°F. While adjusting the heat on a stovetop to maintain a steady temperature can be a bit tedious, this method is made simple by using an immersion circulator. Do not use this method for any pickle except cucumber pickles.
STORING CANNED GOODS
Always store jars with the rings off. This makes it easy to detect a failed seal, prevents problems later on with corroded or stubborn metal rings, and also lets you check to see whether any food is caught between the lid and rim. If you see food on the rim but the seal is secure, simply mark the jar and serve it sooner rather than later.
Label jar lids in permanent marker with the contents and the date of canning. Store jars in a cool, dark, dry place. Storage temperatures between 45° and 60°F maintain good color and are generally suitable for all properly heat-processed foods. Dampness can corrode the lids and seals. Heat from a radiator, stove, furnace, or the sun will cause spoilage. Do not store jars at temperatures over 95°F. If the storage place is likely to approach freezing temperatures, wrap the jars in newspapers, set them in heavy crates or boxes, and cover with newspapers and blankets. For best results, use within a year. After a year, chemical changes will begin to diminish the taste, appearance, and nutritional value of canned foods.
Reprinted with permission from Joy of Cooking: 2019 Edition Fully Revised and Updated by Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker, Ethan Becker, John Becker, and Megan Scott. Copyright © 2019. Published by Scribner, an imprint of Simon & Schuster.
Follow Megan and John on Twitter at @TheJoyOfCooking. They are very friendly and helpful!
Buy The Joy of Cooking for yourself!
Because journalism isn’t a sustainable profession this newsletter uses Amazon Associate links, which means I earn from qualifying purchases.
Like this newsletter? Share it with your friends!
Your New York Minute: