Pickling

I picked some cucumbers today, with an eye toward making some pickles.



As you can see, a couple of them got away from me a little. The one I'm holding weighs a full pound.  It should have been picked several days ago, but it was hiding under the alyssum and escaped notice.

This one, however, is even bigger. I left this one on purpose, though.  It will be allowed to fully ripen and become next year's seed.



I got a total of nine pounds of cukes today, which turned into one quart of whole dill pickles and three quarts of dill pickle spears.  Even though some of the cucumbers were really too big for the ideal pickle-size, they were still fine.  The Boston Pickling variety is perfect for canning, since it is crisp and fleshy, and the seeds stay small for quite a while.  Even the one-pounder in the first picture had hardly any seed cavity.



It's going to be hard to wait the required few weeks before opening a jar of these.