Crock Dills

I know I said sweet pickles for the next post but I am still trying to figure out how to do the post on those as they take 11 to 12 days and maybe I'll just wait till it's all done and make it one post, I'm thinkin' on it!
In the meantime, I will share the pickles I have been eating all week, this is another of those 'summer memory' foods.

Grandma made pickles or cucumber salad with most of her cucumbers but she had so many plants that quite a few of the cukes would get too big for pickle jars, these were the crock dill cukes and we all waited with baited breath till these were ready.  I will share that there are several of these comfort foods that you must have to be born to to like, as my Mom and my Aunt C (married Daddy's brother) neither one ever developed a taste for some of these foods that we who grew up with them dream of!  These taste a lot like the pickles you get at a kosher deli, and they probably are similar as they are essentially a brine pickle. 

Crock Dills

Place 1 bunch of dill in bottom of crock (hence the name - seriously) (a large glass bowl will work), then put washed cucumbers almost to the top of the crock, leaving room for another bunch of dill.

Boil together 1 gallon water and 1 cup canning or picking salt, let cool and pour over cucumbers. Ready to eat in two or 3 days!

 PS: Put a plate upside down on top of the cucumbers and weigh down with a clean rock on top!  (Somewhere in the move I have lost my nice, round, smooth, clean rock that I used for this sort of thing so am using a jar of water.  Have to find another good rock!)

As you remove crock dills you can add cucumbers back in to keep going for awhile – Slime and mold are signs to change the water and dill, but a little haziness is ok!  For some reason the second batch of cucumbers in the brine is always better!  (the first batch is always a little salty and the second a little mellower to me)   These are easy and we used to eat them wrapped in a slice of fresh bread - Yum! 

I tried to plant dill 3 times this year and lost it to bugs, mystery disease and never sprouting, so was forced to use the dill they sell at the store and it worked but it is better with fresh. I'm hoping the local grocery will be carrying the big stalks again this year so I can put up some regular dills yet this summer.  

This guy came to visit the other morning when we were in the garden, he lives with the neighbor behind  us, they said he just showed up one day and decided to stay!  He comes to visit now and then, he may just get tired of listening to the chickens back there! 

He is so pretty - when the sun hits his feathers just right that iridescent blue/green is just beautiful!  I think he knows it though, he always seems arrogant to me!  (I may be doing just a little anthropomorphizing here!)






                                                                            You just never know what will happen around here!  :)