Hello! I’m presenting the last throwback “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe with a VERY SAD heart as this is the day that I discovered I’d lost TWENTY-SIX days of my NaNoWriMo writing, including everything I’d written about what was my current work-in-progress! Such a devastating loss, but there’s nothing that can be done about an inadvertent combination of keyboard strokes. So… I’m trying to move forward by distracting myself — first with a UK Men’s Basketball game and then with this final “Tasty Tuesdays” post of “NaNo-vember” 2024.
As I’ve done for the past three weeks, I am featuring a recipe that was first published in my LiveJournal. This week’s “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe is for “Homemade Refrigerator Pickles”, and it was published on the 31st of January 2017. And now, without further ado, here is that post in its entirety:
Tasty Tuesdays: Homemade Refrigerator Pickles
Location: my office
mood: 🙁 hungry
music: UK pre-game show on WLAP (Go, Cats!)
“Tasty Tuesdays” are back! I know… I know… I’ve said this before (even in the previous entry!), so we’ll see if I’m able to keep it up. I’m striving for more consistency when it comes to posting “Tasty Tuesdays” recipes in 2017.
While going through the produce drawers in my refrigerator, I came across some cucumbers. Unfortunately, a couple of ’em had gone bad while sitting there — forgotten and lonely. BUT a couple of them were still good! This discovery reminded me that today is “Tasty Tuesday Day”. This reminder led me to the decision to post the recipe why all of those cucumbers were in my produce drawers: Homemade Refrigerator Pickles !!
I love pickles, but NOT the price of ’em in the grocery store! So… I decided to make my own. After scouring the Internet, I came across one that sounded easy at the allrecipes.com Web site. I tried it once and loved it. Consequently, it has become my “go to” recipe for pickles. Hopefully, it’ll become your “go to” pickle recipe. (If it isn’t, I’d love to see your “go to” pickle recipe, so please leave it in the comments below.)
Without further ado, here’s today’s “Tasty Tuesdays” recipe:
Homemade Refrigerator Pickles
Ingredients
1 cup distilled white vinegar
1 tablespoon salt
2 cups white sugar
6 cups sliced cucumbers
1 cup sliced onions
1 cup sliced green or red bell peppers
Optional:
2 tablespoons mustard seed
1 tablespoon celery seed
Directions
- Place the cucumbers, onions, and bell peppers in a large bowl, adding the optional ingredients if desired. Set aside.
- In a medium saucepan over medium heat, bring vinegar, salt and sugar to a boil. Boil until the sugar has dissolved, about 10 minutes.
- Pour the vinegar mixture over the vegetables. Transfer to sterile containers and store in the refrigerator.
Personal Notes:
- The moment when the sugar finally dissolves is almost magical! This is my favorite part of making these pickles, and it usually happens right when I’m about to give up on this batch of pickles.
- I generally use a couple of quart-size Mason jars. At this point, this is the extent of my “canning” skills. One of these days, this will change, but until then, I’ll continue “canning” my own pickles, using this recipe.
So, there you have it: a quick and easy way to “can” pickles! Unfortunately, my canning skills haven’t improved much since this post was originally published back in 2017. Since then, I managed to can some apple and grape jelly (from fruit I picked from a neighbor’s apple trees and grape vines), but I haven’t been able to harvest enough cucumbers to attempt canning a batch of pickles. So, yeah… I continue using this recipe for homemade refrigerator pickles. In fact, I think I’ve got a couple of jars of these pickles that need to be eaten soon!
As always, please take a moment to leave me a comment about your experiences canning/making homemade pickles. Looking forward to hearing from you!
P.S. UK Men’s Basketball won their game tonight against Western Kentucky University with a final score of 87-68! Go, Cats!