Monday, August 22, 2011

Canning Pickles

So this summer I am not big and pregnant, I do not have a newborn and my kids are becoming slightly independent so that gives me....hum...5 extra minutes a day for "me"?  So with that extra time, what shall I do? Just kidding of course, but this summer things have slowed down a bit and I have really gotten the gardening/canning bug again!  I am already thinking ahead to next years garden and really wanted to do cucumbers so I could make pickles!  I love pickles, especially bread and butter ones!  So one of our local farmers had pickle cucumbers for sale so I stopped to pick some up.  I also picked up a mix from our local store to  help the process.  It was all quite a whim, but turned out great!  Here are my pictures below and they pickles are AWESOME!  I will say that I tried a regular size cucumber in with the smaller pickle varieties and they both worked fine :)  I'll be planting cucumbers next year and making my pickles from scratch!  They have a shelf life of 18 months! :)