If It's Fall, There's Canning - Sweet Pickles / Bread & Butter Pickles

Well, not at my house. I gave away all my jars years ago. I used to bottle lots of fruit every year, but that was when my kids were home. Even though we like the home-canned fruit better, I just decided that store canned was OK - not as good, but good enough. So, by special request (thanks for reading, Kathi!) I broke my no-canning policy and did a couple of batches of pickles today. And yesterday. I was amazed at how the aroma of cucumbers soaking in salt water brought back memories of home. Frankly, I don't remember putting up pickles, so the memory must have been from my childhood. Mom had three recipes for sweet pickles (which were the requested ones). Her sweet pickles were SO good. I remember them soaking in an old crock with cheesecloth on top. Well, I didn't do those. First, I don't have a crock. Second, I didn't want to spend four weeks making pickles. I chose the "overnight" version, but I'm hopeful. She did make a little comment about the amount of pickling spice to use, so maybe she made these, too. Here's the recipe:

SWEET PICKLES (OVERNIGHT)
8 quarts med. cucumbers cut in chunks
4 quarts water
1 cup salt
Soak overnight and drain.
In the morning boil 15 minutes in solution of:
1 pint vinegar
2 tsp. turmeric
2 quarts water
Drain and rinse in cold water.
Pack in jars and pour prepared syrup of:
10 cups sugar
5 cups vinegar
4 cups water
2 handfuls mixed pickling spices (I don't use this much)
Boil about 5 minutes. Seal.

Notice that there is no mention anywhere about green food coloring. Well, Mom used it so I had to include it. I wasn't sure as to when to add or how much, so I'm pretty sure it doesn't matter. And I used the pickling spice from the new container. I heard on the radio that if you have any spices in square cans to throw them out - they're too old and have lost their potency. You can see I didn't throw it out, but I didn't use it this time either. I got 13 pints from this recipe.

I only bought a half box of pickling cucumbers - I had to go to five places before I found them. I was really sad to learn that the old fruit stand where we used to take the fruit from our orchard had finally closed for good. Of course I went there first, if nothing else than for sentimental reasons. Anyway, I was only going to make half a batch of sweet pickles but that only used half of my half box so I made a full recipe. We'll never eat that many pickles! With the rest of the cukes (Mom liked to use that word) I made Bread & Butter Pickles for Doug. He likes that kind - now I hope he'll like mine. And I also hope he develops a taste for sweet pickles because we have way more than we'll use. Anyone out there want some just let me know!

BREAD & BUTTER PICKLES

1 doz. small cukes, sliced
1/2 doz. small onions, sliced
Sprinkle with salt & let stand 1 hour then drain.
1 pint vinegar
1 cup sugar
2 tsp. mustard seed
1 tsp. celery seed
1 tsp. tumeric
Bring to a boil. Add cukes & onions. Boil 30 min. Seal.

I only got two pints from this recipe!