a quest to find a pickle I will eat...

I really don't like pickles. At all. Being exposed to the nasty deli tray pickles at work pretty much all the time (and every time you open the office fridge door) doesn't help, but I can't recall liking pickles since I was little. I remember not minding dill pickles, and also the ones that my grandmother made. And she was famous for her pickles.

So when Mark and I got the chance to get a case of organic cucumbers at a really reasonable price, we jumped on the opportunity to can them in a few varieties. First up, dill pickles, made with dill from our own garden.

We also used canning salt (the additives in regular salt can make your brine cloudy), which the brand name for some reason I keep calling Mrs. Pickles instead of Mrs. Wages.

(As you can tell, we had a ton of cucumbers. The ones stacked on the island behind the bowl were only part of them. We still had a half a case that we hadn't touched yet.)

My spice bag had larger holes than was useful, so some of the spice got out, but it's okay if it ends up in the brine in the jars.

(Mark is using the blue stick to remove air bubbles from the inside of the jar. That tool doubles as a head space measurement tool, which lets you know if you have the proper amount of space between the lid and the contents to affect a good seal.)

We got 6 quarts out of this batch. Here's the shelf update!

Cherry jam, bread and butter pickles, and a garden update still to come!