Quickest Kosher Dills - or Dilly Beans or Pickled Carrots or...

It has been a long time since I posted. The best intentions have been left behind in a pile of sandy, wet beach towels and swimming costumes and in discarded tennis rackets (not mine) and ankle twisting balls. They are buried under a stack of art camp projects, library books (always very stressful if it is about to be returned unread) and six-paper drawings. They are left in the dust of learning to ride a bike between the rain showers and in trying to cram four months of catching up and memory making experiences into four short weeks of Daddy home time. The recipes and my barely used camera will sit and wait, my children do not. EVER.

I should say that those intentions have also fallen to the odd bit of real work, picnic preparation and to my late summer canning and preserving drive. My husband worries about space and shelf stability. I worry about what we will do if we run out of dill pickles in March. He reliably reminds me that there is a supermarket we can walk to in less than five minutes. I tell him it isn’t the same, he doesn’t understand. He says we don’t eat jam. I say it is to give as gifts. He asks how much money do you spend on jars. I tell him the lady I met at Canadian Tire gave me hundreds. He rolls his eyes. I know he knows I will not relent.

I am not going to bore you with telling you about everything I have made. I will tell you once again that if you can just eek out a few hours to put something up, you will be very happy you did. There is still plenty of lush inspiration - blueberries, tomatoes, plums, pears and apples.

Last year’s pickles did not work out very well. In fact, most of them wound up composted. I am not sure what I did or didn’t do but they weren’t for eating. This year, I wasn’t even going to bother making any. I then thought about making fermented ones but realized that I would actually have to remember that they were fermenting. Then, in my new carry-it-around-all-the-time favourite guide, I found a recipe for Quickest Kosher Dills and knew I would be making pickles after all.

This recipe can be used for carrots and beans as well.  With carrots, you can keep the spices pretty much the same. For beans, I would be inclined to make them a little spicier. I used fresh dill which is great especially if you can find some with big flowering heads just going to seed. You can also use the fresh feathery fronds, stalks and you can use dried dill seed as well. The original recipe calls for scuttermong or grape leaves which keeps pickles crisper apparently. Had my children not been in bed I may have asked my friend Nicki if I could nip over and snip a few leaves off her vines but I can not imagine how crisp a pickle would need to be to warrant disturbing that divine post-bedtime peace. So, I left it out and, although I have never used it before, I expect my pickles will be just fine.

The math is pretty simple here and, in order to change from pints to quarts(which you may want to use if you are making carrots), you may need to adjust your quantities, You will need about one cup of liquid for every pint, so that is two cups for every quart. This recipe will make enough for ten pints or five quarts. 

If you are making dill pickles, please use pickling cucumbers. The flavour and texture is much better than other cucumbers. How you slice them is up to you. I like small ones if I am leaving them whole and mediumish (3-inch) ones if I am slicing or quartering. If you are quartering, I suggest you use quart jars instead of pints. For carrots, if you have large ones you can just peel and slice them into quarters, sixths or eighths lengthwise and trim them to be long enough to sit just at the shoulders of the quart jar. Beans do well in a pint jar and again, topped to sit just at the shoulders.

Quickest Kosher Dills adapted from Canning for a New Generation by Liana Krissof

(makes 10 pints or 5 quarts)

2.5 kg (5lb 8oz.) pickling cucumbers(as I mentioned above, I like using +/- 3-inch ones)

5 cups natural white vinegar 

5 cups water

4 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt

10 teaspoons pickling spice

10 cloves garlic

Fresh dill

Clean 10 pint or 5 quart canning jars.

Rinse cucumbers in cold water. Remove the blossom end if you are quartering, remove both ends if you are slicing. Quarter or slice the cucumbers 1/4-inch thick.

Meanwhile heat your jars in a hot water bath.

Bring the vinegar, water and salt to a boil for five minutes, cover to avoid too much evaporation.

Put the lids in a bowl and pour some water from the hot water bath over them.

Carefully remove the jars from the hot water bath and, working quickly, put a teaspoon of pickling spice, a clove of garlic and a sprig of dill in the bottom of each jar. Pack the cucumber quarters or slices tightly.

Pour the hot vinegar mixture into the packed jars leaving 1/2-inch headspace. Wipe the rims and put the lids on. Screw on the rings until they are just finer tight.

Return the jars to the hot water bath, where they should be covered by one inch of water. Bring to a boil. Boil for ten minutes.

Remove the jars to a towel and leave for 12 hours. Check after an hour or two and if any jars haven’t sealed (if you can still press the lid down), put them in the fridge immediately.

Putting Up Summer - A Challenge

The growing season is short here. And, it is about this time of year that a certain anxiety takes over me. Not so badly that I can’t enjoy summer but badly enough that I start scheduling life around the availability of fruits and vegetables.

Normally, I know in the back of my head that we will be going away for some portion of the winter months. This is the first time since I started doing any sort of preserving that I I am planning on being here for all of the winter months. So, my anxiety is at an all time high. 

As herbs start growing I whizz them into a ‘pesto’ and toss them in the freezer. By pesto, I mean any combination of herb mixed with olive oil and whizzed. I don’t use nuts or cheese in most so that they are that they are easier to toss in to anything for anyone. Swiss chard and spinach are getting blanched and frozen. Garlic scapes, a lot of them, have been pestoed and frozen or pickled. I am imagining pickled garlic scape tartar sauce as soon as they have sat for a few weeks. Strawberries have been picked, hulled and frozen. Others have been turned into jam, two types. 

For the first time in my jam making career, I didn’t muddle around with the recipe and low and behold, it looks like it has set. Just in time for my children to decide that they don’t like jam. The other type got muddled with and is a little runnier as the result of a little less sugar and some balsamic and black pepper. I can taste it with creamy goat cheese and it is going to be good.

Currently, there is a big jar of nasturtium seeds brining on my countertop. Who knew those things could be quite so stinky. There is a definite waft of boiled eggs as you walk in to our house, especially when the jar gets a little jiggle. I am told, by many folk and website, that they will be pretty similar to capers.

I have great plans for the rest of the summer’s produce. I have a new canning bible, Canning for a New Generation. All I can say is, it will likely teach you a ton of stuff, it has me. If you plan on putting up any amount of produce or you want to make some lovely gifts, this is a book I would get. 

I want to know what it is you ‘put up,’ if anything. And, to that end and without getting caught up in any social movement, I want to issue a challenge, a project if you will. It will just take a few hours, I know they aren’t often easy to come by. Think of something you buy through the winter, or something that you buy that you think you could make. Maybe it is jam or pickles. Maybe it is pesto or tomato sauce. Look up a recipe, I will gladly help if you get stuck. Spend a few hours getting everything ready and preserve something to use later on. You can turn it into a family project or just take some time for yourself and enjoy the satisfaction it offers.

You do not need any fancy equipment, a really big pot will help. If you have a canner in the basement, or attic, or your mother-in-law’s cupboard, you could use it but, unless you are making huge jars of something or lots of jars, you should be fine.

Ideally, and for best results, you should choose something at the peak of its growing season for a couple of reasons. The first is that it tastes the best and the second, well, it usually costs less.

So, tell me if you are up for the challenge. I am by no means an expert, but I will happily help anyone out as best I can.