Pickles

Kinds of pickles

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• Fermented: regular dill pickles and sauerkraut cure for about 3 weeks as lactic acid bacteria convert sugars to acid; refrigerator dills ferment about a week.
• Fresh-pack (quick-process): not fermented. Vegetables may be brined a few hours or overnight, then covered with vinegar and seasonings.
• Fruit pickles: fruit heated in a spiced syrup acidified with vinegar or lemon juice.
• Relishes: chopped fruit and vegetables cooked with vinegar and spices.

Acid is the safety factor

Cucumbers and other vegetables are low-acid. Pickling makes them acid foods, below pH 4.6, which is what allows a boiling-water canner ¹. So the USDA’s cautions are firm ¹:

• Don’t alter vinegar, food, or water proportions, and don’t use vinegar of unknown acidity.
• Use only tested recipes.
• There must be a minimum, uniform level of acid throughout the product to prevent botulinum growth.

Ingredients

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• Produce: fresh, firm, free of spoilage; pickling cucumbers, picked small and used within a day.
• Blossom end: cut off and discard 1/16 in. from the blossom end; it may contain an enzyme that softens pickles.
• Salt: canning or pickling salt. Anticaking agents in table salt cloud the brine, and flake salt varies too much in density.
• Vinegar: white distilled or cider vinegar of 5% acidity. White keeps light-colored vegetables bright.
• Sugar: white or brown; corn syrup or honey only when a recipe calls for them.
• Measure carefully: the ratio of produce to other ingredients affects safety, not just flavor.

Worked recipe: quick fresh-pack dills

From the USDA guide, about 7-9 pints ²:

1. Wash 8 lb of 3- to 5-in. pickling cucumbers, cut 1/16 in. off the blossom end, and leave 1/4 in. of stem.
2. Dissolve 3/4 cup pickling salt in 2 gallons of water, pour over the cucumbers, and let stand 12 hours. Drain.
3. Combine 1-1/2 quarts of 5% vinegar, 1/2 cup salt, 1/4 cup sugar, and 2 quarts water, with 2 tbsp mixed pickling spice tied in cloth. Bring to a boil.
4. Fill hot jars with cucumbers; add 1 tsp mustard seed and 1-1/2 heads of fresh dill (or 1-1/2 tsp dill seed) per pint.
5. Cover with the boiling solution, leaving 1/2 in. headspace. Remove bubbles, wipe rims, and lid.
6. Process in a boiling-water canner: raw-packed pints 10 minutes at 0-1,000 ft, 15 minutes at 1,001-6,000 ft, or use the low-temperature pasteurization method ².

Crisper pickles

• Low-temperature pasteurization: for cucumber pickles, process 30 minutes in water held at 180 °F, never below, checked with a thermometer; it prevents spoilage and gives a firmer pickle ¹.
• Food-grade lime: soak cucumbers 12-24 hours in lime water, then remove the excess by draining, rinsing, and soaking in fresh water for 1 hour, three times. Excess lime must be removed for safety ¹.
• Alum is safe for fermented pickles but unnecessary, and doesn’t firm quick pickles ¹.
• Fresh, cold cucumbers picked that day matter more than any additive.

Salt and fermentation

Fresh-pack pickles can be made with reduced salt using tested recipes, though texture and flavor suffer ¹. Fermented pickles and sauerkraut are different: the salt favors the desirable bacteria and inhibits others, so it’s vital to safety and texture. Don’t cut the salt in fermented recipes ¹. (Fermentation gets its own lesson in Sauerkraut and Fermented Pickles.)

Try it

Make a half batch of quick fresh-pack dills from the USDA recipe with cucumbers from the garden or farmers’ market. Process half the jars in boiling water and half by low-temperature pasteurization, and compare crispness after a month.

What to take from this

Pickling makes vegetables acid foods; the acid is the safety factor, so never change the vinegar, water, or produce proportions in a tested recipe, and use 5% vinegar and pickling salt. Trim the blossom end. Quick fresh-pack dills are brined 12 hours, packed with dill and mustard seed, covered with boiling vinegar solution at 1/2 in. headspace, and processed 10 minutes per pint up to 1,000 ft (15 above), or pasteurized at 180 °F for crispness. Never cut the salt in fermented pickles.