Pickles are delicious and easy to make on your own. Pickling your own cucumbers takes a little prep work and can give you pickles that are fresher than store-bought. Plus, when you prepare your cucumbers yourself, you know exactly what went into your pickles! How do you properly prepare your cucumbers to be pickled?
To prepare cucumbers for pickling:
- Wash the cucumbers fully, scrubbing away dirt.
- Slice cucumbers according to the pickle shape desired.
- Place cucumbers into a jar or other container.
- Follow the desired recipe for pickles of your choosing.
You will find countless pickle recipes online, but a major part of creating a delicious pickle is quality cucumbers and proper prep work. We’ll cover the process in more detail below, as well as how to harvest your own cucumbers properly for pickling, and even which cucumbers you should be choosing to pickle!
How to Prepare Cucumbers for Pickling
There are a few key things you will need to do before you begin the pickling process.
Prepping for Pickling
To prep your cucumbers for pickling, you will want to place your cucumbers in the refrigerator in a moisture-proof plastic bag or container. This will help keep them fresh until you can begin the pickling process.
- Wash your cucumbers in cold water. You want to do this until all of the dirt from the plants is removed from the skin. You can use a vegetable brush to assist you in this process if the dirt is hard to remove.
- At this point, cut off a small piece of the cucumber from each end. If you still have the cucumber blossom attached, make sure to remove this. You will discard of these ends as they do not pickle well and are not aesthetically pleasing.
- Then cut your cucumbers into the proper shape for pickling. This can range depending on what you are hoping to achieve, whether it be slices for traditional hamburger pickles or in halves for spears. You can even keep very small pickles whole, but the larger the pickle pieces, the longer it will take from them to properly pickle.
You will then want to begin pickling your cucumbers based on the recipe that you have chosen. This will differ depending on the type of pickles you are hoping to make, but you want to have your ingredients in place prior to prepping your cucumbers. A good pickle does not always come from a difficult recipe and you should never go outside of your comfort zone when preparing them!
Once the cucumbers are cut, they need to be placed in the pickling liquid quickly.
How to Properly Harvest Your Own Cucumbers for Pickling
If you really want to nail your home pickle game, you’ll want to grow your own cucumbers yourself. Harvesting your cucumbers for pickling is different than just normal harvesting, and you want to make sure to do it correctly.
If you are hoping to make gherkin or sweet pickles, you want to harvest your cucumbers a little earlier, ideally at two inches long. For dill pickles, you can let them grow a little longer until they are about three or four inches long. You will find that most pickling cucumbers do not get much larger than this, only slicing cucumbers reach much larger sizes.
- Wear gloves when you harvest your cucumbers. Some of the vines or plants are prickly and wearing gloves can help avoid getting poked.
- When you pick your cucumbers, you will want to leave a small one-inch section of stem on the cucumbers. By leaving this bit of stem, you can leave your cucumbers in storage longer without the ends of them rotting. This is a step you do not want to skip if you are not planning on making pickles right away.
- Remove the cucumber while keeping this bit of vine, you can use a sharp knife or some pruners. You can easily damage the plant if you pull on the vine.
- If your cucumbers have an excess of spines, you will want to remove them. This can be done by using a cloth or a vegetable brush.
Which Cucumbers are Best for Pickling?
You can always buy cucumbers at your local grocery store or farmers’ market if you would like to bypass this growing step. However, if you want to get fully homemade pickles, you can always start by growing your own cucumbers for this process.
Cucumbers are fairly easy to grow and the seeds or starter plants are super easy to find. There are two main types of cucumbers that you can choose from, slicing or pickling. You will want to ensure you are getting pickling options when you begin growing your cucumber garden.
- Slicing Cucumbers – These tend to be larger in size and are much better for fresh eating. They have thinner skins than pickling options.
- Pickling Cucumbers – These are shorter than the slicing options, making them better in size for pickling. They have thicker and crispier skins than slicing as well. Overall, they withstand the pickling process much better.
Top 2 Pickling Cucumbers
You will find several varieties of cucumber seeds available each year, but not all pickling cucumbers are the same. Any cucumbers that say pickling in the title are fair game when it comes to creating pickles. However, if you are interested in growing the absolute best pickling cucumbers, two top options are:
The National Pickling Cucumber
From the name alone, you can almost guarantee this is a good choice for practically any pickle variety. Whether you want to make smaller, younger pickles from shorter cucumbers, or you want to allow them to reach four to five inches before picking, these are a great choice. This variety of cucumbers was developed with help from the National Pickle Packers Association.
These cucumbers are great for pickling as they have a dark green skin that packs a super crunch. If you opt for this plant variety, you will be certain to get a large number of cucumbers throughout the growing season. They can take a couple of months to reach maturity, but you will get a lot of cucumbers from the plants.
One thing you will want to note about the National Pickling Cucumber is that it needs a lot of room to grow. The vines will spread out and work best if you have a trellis or fence they can grow along. If you do not have a large amount of room, it may be best to start with just one or two plants.
The Bush Pickle
This is one of the absolute best pickling varieties of cucumbers you can find out there today. They grow up to three to five inches in size and uniquely grow on a bush rather than a vine. These bushes can get quite large, ranging in size from 24 to 36 inches in height.
If you have limited space, this is a great option for growing cucumbers. They can be planted in smaller pots or containers, versus growing in a garden. They usually mature in about 50 to 55 days and you want to ensure you are keeping cucumbers picked to keep new blooms growing.
Conclusion
When it comes to creating your own pickles, you have to start with quality cucumbers from a pickling variety rather than a slicing variety. You will want to harvest and prep your cucumbers properly, by picking them at the right length, washing them, and cutting them. Once prepped, you can begin the pickling process depending on the type of pickles you want to achieve.