Jo's Award Winning Cucumber Pickle

When looking at ways to deal with my overabundance of cucumbers last year (thanks to the wonderful gift of a wartime kitchen garden last year from my husband) I had to find something else to do with them. This recipe from The Cottage Smallholder website a) worked and b) was easy enough that my first batch of pickles was a huge hit, and made lovely gifts, with requests for more!

Equipment:

• Spoon measurements
• Kitchen scales
• Knife
• Mandolin slicer if you have it
• Chopping board (wooden if you have it)
• Large mixing bowl
• Dinner plate that fits inside the mixing bowl
• Tea towel
• Colander
• Large stainless steel saucepan
• Slotted spoon
• Tongs
• 10 small glass jars (250 ml) and plastic lined metal lids that match (see below)
• Labels for your jars & a pen.

Ingredients:

• 4 large or six small cucumbers - I like the lebanese ones
• 3 medium brown onions
• 50g salt
• 1 bottle  white wine vinegar
• 450g soft brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp of ground tumeric
• 1/2 tsp ground cloves (or mixed spice also works)
• 1 tablespoon of mustard seeds

Methods:

1. Don't start this late at night - you need to wait for three hours in the middle and can't skip the process.
2. Wash cucumbers, slice thinly - we took the hint and used our mandolin slicer
3. Peel the onions and slice them very thinly (with the knife or mandolin slicer)
4. In your large bowl layer as follows: a layer of cucumbers, then a layer of onion, then sprinkle with salt, and repeat until you've used up all your ingredients. Weigh them down with your plate. Cover with your tea-towel and put in the fridge.

You now have a break for three hours (yep, three hours).

1. Put your jars in the oven, and the metal lids into boiling water to sterilize them (see below).
2. Drain the liquid that has separated out from your onions and cucumbers by pouring them into your colander, and rinse under cold water.
3. Put vinegar, sugar and spices into the saucepan, on a medium heat. Stir until the sugar has dissolved. 
4. Add the cucumber and onions into the saucepan and bring it to the boil, boiling it for a couple of minutes.
5. Using your slotted spoon take out all your vegetables, and put them in your large kitchen bowl.
6. Keep your syrup boiling for another 15 minutes to reduce the pickling liquid.
7. Pull your jars out of the oven with oven gloves or your tea towel, and put them on your wooden chopping board or a heatproof surface. Turn the stove ring under your lids off.
8. Using your tongs put the cucumber and onions into the jars - don't overfill as you have to cover with pickling liquid, and leave an air gap. Don't press them down - they need space for the pickling liquid, and it won't trap air - you don't want that.
9. Now pour your boiling pickling liquid into the jars, making sure you cover your cucumbers and onions. Don't fill to the brim.
10. Drain your metal lids, and taking care not to burn yourself, screw them in place. 
11. Write out your labels and stick on your filled jars.
12. Put them in a cool, dark, dry place, and leave for at least a month to mature.

Sterilizing the Jars:

I bought my jars and lids from my local tobacconist who also stocks pickling, cheese-making and homebrew stuff. At least in part because I wanted to store them in small enough jars to have it only open in the fridge for a week. And this turned out to be nice because they looked pretty and could be given as small gifts. Others tend to pickle from recycled jars - but they do buy new lids as a rule to make sure they don't get botulism poisoning. 

The way to sterilize the jars is to wash them in hot water, and then put them in the cold oven upside down. Then turn the oven on to 150 Celsius. At the same time in a small saucepan, put your lids in cold water and put them on to boil. By the time you have done everything else, your jars and lids will be sterilized.