The Best Way to Grow and Use Cucumbers

Cucumbers are a tender crisp vegetable with a high water content that thrive in tropical environments. They need lots of heat, sun, and water. the fruit are long, slender, and edible with seeds on the inside that are also edible. They are grown around the world as an annual plant.

Cucumbers are an interesting vegetable because of their variety of uses. Usually when we talk about the benefits of a certain vegetable we are talking about internally or medicinally. With cucumbers their benefits are external and internal and they are just yummy!

Types of Cucumber

There are two types of growth patterns for cucumbers. Bush and Trailing. Both have their benefits for different parts of the garden but I usually opt for trailing varieties so that I can trellis them and save some room in the garden.

The varieties of cucumbers are myriad and also fall into two categories; thin and thick skinned. The thick waxy skin on a cucumber can be eaten but the thicker it is the harder it is to eat and it can sometimes be very bitter. I like the thin skin varieties of cucumbers so I don’t have to stop and peel them in the garden. I can just pick them from the vine and munch right into them.

Growing Cucumbers

When starting a garden one of the easiest crops to grow is cucumbers for beginners.

Cucumbers are an easy crop to grow and do not require much by way of care. They can be trellised or planted as a bush.

They need a moderate amount of nutrients as most vegetables do and do well in hot humid environments. Keep your cucumber plant well watered and fertilize with organic fertilizers every few weeks.

When the cucumber starts to fruit make sure that it is up off the ground where it could be eaten by slugs, birds or other critters. That is one reason I like the vine type of cucumber plant.

Pickling

When a cucumber is good for pickling it usually tells you in the description. These varieties are bred to be shorter than the average length of cucumber and generally tend to have a thick but not too thick skin. They also usually have prickly little stickers throughout the skin which are washed off but leave behind a small bumps or knobs that are associated with pickle skin.

Recipes

Along with the many different varieties of cucumbers come a multitude of pickling recipes. Cooked, refrigerated, sweet, spicy… you name it.

Some of my favorite pickle recipes are Chef John from Food Wishes Bread and Butter Pickles which are divine. And of the refrigerator variety Claussen’s Kosher dill pickles have my heart. So of course I had to try and make them. Reading the ingredient list there are a lot of things that I was unable to get my hands on so I stuck with the organic ingredient list.

• Fresh Cucumbers
• Water
• Pickling Salt
• Distilled Vinegar
• Dried Garlic
• Spice
• Mustard Seed
• Dried Red Bell Pepper
• Turmeric

I had to guess on the spice part but looking in the jar I could see dill seed, caraway seed, whole all spice, whole black pepper corn, ground bay leaf, and ground cinnamon (not powder) and one reddish brown thing I couldn’t quite identify by taste or look.

Was I crazy enough to take microscopic samples of the brine and taste and inspect to identify them. Yep, yep that was me. But, it was worth it. I now have the closest recipe I have found to the Claussen dill pickles.

Refrigerator Dill Pickles

sweetolivefarms

Fresh, crispy dill pickles you can make from the garden.

Print Recipe

Prep Time 4 days d 1 hour hr

Cook Time 11 minutes mins

Course Side Dish

Equipment

• 4-6 Pint jars with lids

Ingredients

  

• 15-20 small-medium pickling cucumbers
• 8 Cups Water
• 1 Cup Distilled Vinegar
• 1/3 Cup Kosher Salt
• 2 tsp Mustard seed
• 1/2 tsp Black pepper corn whole
• 1/2 tsp Whole All Spice
• 1/2 tsp Rough Ground Bay Leaf
• 1/4 tsp Ground Cinnamon Not POWDER
• 1 tsp Caraway Seed
• 1 Tbsp Dill Seed Or one head of fresh dill
• 1/4 Cup Minced Dried Garlic
• 1 Tbps Dried Red Bell Pepper

Instructions

 

• 1. Prepare the cucumbers by washing thoroughly and removing the blossom end. Slice as desired and place in jars.

  2. Combine the water and vinegar in a large stock pot on the stove.

  3. Once it reaches a soft boil remove from the heat and add the salt and spices and garlic.

  4. Pour the brine over the jars of cucumbers. Let sit without lids on counter until cooled.

  5. Put the lids on and place in the refrigerator for 2-3 days.

Keyword Garden Pickles, Pickles