Filed under: Food | Tags: CSA, cucumber, eggs, farm, Grant Farms, pickle, preserving, produce, vegetable
Since I don’t have my own farm yet, CodeMonkey and I signed up for a CSA farmshare from Grant Family Farms this year. We get a “single” box of produce and a dozen eggs every week which we share with NurseK.
The eggs are awesome – super yummy and laid by hens that are allowed to run around living their happy chicken lives on open pasture.
Oh yeah, and sometimes they’re blue or green. How cool is that.
The produce has been really interesting too. It’s been a fun challenge to try to use up everything in the box every week. Some of the produce is challenging because it’s unusual – kohlrabi, daikon radish, caraflex cabbage, lemon cucumbers, and more. Some of it is challenging because there’s just so darn much of it. Even with just the single box and sharing with NurseK, there have been weeks where I put zucchini (or cilantro, or radishes, or . . .) in everything I cooked. I’ve also been drying and/or freezing a bunch of stuff. Recently I was faced with an overabundance of cucumbers so I decided to do some pickling.
While three good sized cucumbers were too much for me to eat by myself before they went bad (CodeMonkey is anti cucumber), it really wasn’t enough to justify going all out with the water-bath canning and everything so I decided to make some refrigerator pickles. I used Alton Brown’s recipes and made one jar of Sweets and one jar of Sours.
Gather the ingredients.
Sterilize the jars.
Fill the jars.
Boil the brine.
Brine the pickles.
Label, refrigerate for a few days, and enjoy!
The pickles should keep for a few months in the refrigerator, which is good because CodeMonkey doesn’t eat pickles any more than he eats cucumbers. Mmm . . . pickles.
5 Comments so far
Leave a comment
Sheared Bliss 
That’s because pickles are just disguised cucumbers. In the same way that bologna is just really fat hot dogs.
Comment by MommaCodeMonkey October 7, 2010 @ 4:19 pmWoohoo. Mmmm. Pickles. I think the garden planning at the Farmette should include 2x as many cucumber plants, and 1/2 as many summer squash. But this time, we’ll plant the cucumbers where I don’t have to haul hose to them. Sprinkler systems are a much better idea! So if I have extra produce, send it your way? I get the feeling we’ll be trying to do a couple of preserving bees next fall… 🙂
Comment by montecelery October 7, 2010 @ 9:52 pmOoh, yeah, some preserving bees would be great! Not to be confused with preserving bees which is just gross and the stingers get stuck in your teeth 😉 I can contribute any of the peaches from my neighbors’ tree that fall on our side of the fence. A lot of them went to waste this year because CodeMonkey and I couldn’t use them fast enough. Maybe some apples and cherries too if I can manage to get around to asking the neighbors if I can actually go into their yard to pick them.
Comment by ShearedBliss October 8, 2010 @ 9:57 amThose pickles look wonderful. And I don’t even like pickles all that much.
Comment by NurseK October 8, 2010 @ 1:34 pmI’ll let you try some, if you want. I think they’d be really good with some cheese and bread for a nice ploughman’s lunch.
Comment by ShearedBliss October 8, 2010 @ 10:57 pm