These are the crispest pickles! I did cut the sugar in half, left out the sweet peppers, added 1 t. pickling spice instead of the celery seed and 2 t. red pepper flakes. Wonderful! I have had the piclkes for 1 week and already shared the recipe with 5 friends.
This is how I modify this recipe for 1 Gallon jar of pickles and veggies:
15 pickling cucumbers, 1 red bell pepper (cut bite size), 1 yellow bell pepper (cut bite size), 2 texas sweet onions (cut bite size), 1 entire stalk of celery (cut bite size), 8 carrots (peeled and cut on bias). Then 2 Tablespoons salt, 2 teaspoons of celery seed. Brine is made of 1 3/4 cups sugar, and 1 1/4 cup white wine vinegar. I only put cucumber, onion bellpepper into the salt mixture. These are all the vegetables that we have tried and they are great this way!
So easy to do, and the taste is excellent. I even kept adding cucumbers for weeks into the recipe and it was just as good!
Not really pickles, but delicious all the same! To make "pickles" crispy, MAKE THE VINEGAR SOLUTION FIRST, and refrigerate. Use REFRIGERATED cucumbers and after salting, put them BACK in the frig. I cut the sugar to 3/4 cup; used 2 cups Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar (it has mother in it, great stuff); used the Hothouse English Cucumbers in plastic wrap, and peeled them a little bit, not all the way. No onion and no green pepper; instead I placed a fresh Serrano chile pepper halved lengthwise in each jar, because we appreciate hot and spicy food. I did use a Tablespoon of crushed red pepper flakes, and a Tablespoon of celery seed. If I had fresh dill I would have tossed a sprig in. I put the cucumbers into the jars first, then covered them to the top with the vinegar solution. If you don't have enough vinegar solution, do NOT add water...just fill each jar up evenly, then top with more vinegar. Taste the next day, some may prefer more sugar, but not me! Another good thing...as each jar empties of pickles, just add more cucumbers!
Pickles are crisp frest tasting and delightfully good. My husband and I are sure to get raves when we take these pickles to our family outing. It took no time at all for us to make them. Thanks for sharing.
Very very good. I'll cut the sugar next time but I think that's just personal preference - my husband did not think they were too sweet at all. I might also do an experiment with Splenda. Used white onion because I didn't have red. I cut the cucumbers REALLY thin so it turned out more like a cucumber salad than pickles but delicious nonetheless. Plan to double or triple if you're taking to a picnic or barbeque!
If you take the advice to halve the amount of sugar, this really is a 5 star recipe. I'm not a big fan of celery seed so I left that out. I made half with dried dill and half with a couple of crushed cloves of garlic - I like the garlic pickles just a little bit more. This is a great way to use up garden cukes. Thanks!
I liked these pickles. They were my first try at making pickles. Very easy to make. My husband did not care for them, he said they taste too much like cucumbers. If you like cucumber salad, you will like these.
This made the best pickles I have ever eaten. And judging by the requests I got for the recipe (and more pickles!), others obviously agree! I used 1 cup of sugar, red bell pepper, and a regular sweet onion, thinly sliced end to end. I used 2 tsp. of kosher salt. I cut into slightly thick slices, and they were incredibly crunchy, and so delicious. The cider vinegar is a great idea, it is much milder tasting than white vinegar. LOVE this recipe, and will be using it over and over.
