Somewhat Kosher Dill Pickles recipe

The kosher pickle is probably the most widely-known naturally fermented pickle. It is the fermentation which gives them their distinct sour-but-not-vinegary flavor. Fresh, healthy produce should be used for pickling. Ugly produce is fine; mold-infected produce is not. Mold starts by causing the vegetable matter to soften and liquefy, so be on the lookout for blemishes which are accompanied by soft spots. If the vegetable is firm, chances are it is okay. Because the natural fermentation arises from the lactic acid bacteria which are naturally present on the skins of all fruits and vegetables, it is important not to peel the vegetables, or at least not completely. If the vegetables must be completely peeled, then some other source of the bacterial culture (an innoculant) must be used to start the growth of LABs in the pickles. Brine from other fermented pickles, some of the peeled skin, or even some other unpeeled vegetable.

This natural fermentation depends upon salt concentration to ensure that only LABs are able to proliferate. Since the brine is solely responsible for preventing the growth of bad bacteria, it is important that the brine have a high enough salt content for the by-weight proportion of salt in the final product to be at least 2.5%. The general rule of thumb is that there will be half-and-half vegetable pieces and brine in the jar, and since the density of vegetables is slightly less than water’s, it is safe to use a 5% salt brine because once osmosis has taken place the concentration of salt in the pickles should be a little over 2.5% by weight. Before that, the brine’s salt concentration will be higher, which protects the vegetable pieces, provided that they are submerged.

Yeast will grow on the brine’s surface. It doesn’t taste very good, so it’s best to skim off as much as possible. Any that sinks in will die and contribute to the characteristic layer of lees at the bottom of the jar. Floating colonies of yeast provide a substrate for the growth of mold, which is generally a different color from the barely off-white yeast, and it will produce compounds that are intensely unpleasant as well as potentially toxic. For this reason it is important to check your pickles frequently, to deny mold a chance to get started.

Once the pickles have fermented at room temperature a couple days, they should be refrigerated. It may be better to leave the lid a little loose at first. For instance, if the fermentation has been really vigorous and makes the brine seem like a soda, then if it is tightly lidded and placed in the refrigerator, it may still be warm enough to produce considerable pressure inside the vessel; this is undesirable as it can lead to explosions. The pickles are never cooked, which helps them stay crunchy even when they are a bit flexible from the pickling process. Also, it is important to ensure that everything is clean: the vessel and its lid, the produce, your hands, and any other tools which will come into contact with the food.

Equipment:
• pickling vessels, generally large mason jars
• kitchen scale for weighing salt
• metric measuring cup with large capacity
• vegetable brush for scrubbing vegetables

Ingredients:
2-4 lb small pickling cucumbers
2-4 ea unripe dill seed heads or 1 Tbsp dill seed
2 ea dried chili peppers
1⁄2 Tbsp mustard seed white or yellow look best
1⁄2 tsp coriander seed
1 litre water in two halves
50 g salt Kosher or sea salt; not iodized salt

Procedure:
1. Figure out the total volume of your jars, then prepare half that much brine.
2. The brine proportions given in this recipe are meant for a two-litre container; scale them up or down as you need, so long as you use 50g salt / 1 litre (1 kg) of water. Using the metric system makes it very easy to calculate the amount of salt needed for any volume of water; just divide by 20.
3. Combine half of the water with all of the salt and bring it to a boil.
4. Meanwhile, ensure the pickling vessels are clean, sanitized and dry.
5. Once the salt solution has come to the boil, turn it off and combine it with the other half of the water to bring its
temperature down.
6. Scrub the future pickles.
7. Trim off any extraneous bits. If the vegetables are especially large, cut them into large chunks.
8. Arrange the spices, dill heads and pickles into the vessel(s) as closely packed as practical.
9. Once the brine is at room temperature, pour it over the pickles to cover them.
10. If you have a pickle weight, great! Otherwise, wedge your pickles under the shoulder of the jar or use slices of
onion to hold the pickles under the brine.
11. Let your pickles sit at room temperature for a few days, up to a couple of weeks, until the brine starts to become cloudy. Remember to keep the surface of the brine skimmed clean during this period.
12. Once the pickles have fermented to whatever extent is desired, refrigerate them.
13. Even refrigerated pickles may sometimes need skimming.

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Welcome back to love your food this week we’re showing you a really great recipe for dill pickles now this is a fermented pickle a lot of people don’t realize that the sour taste of dill pickles actually comes from the fermentation process and not from vinegar it comes from that natural fermentation along

With some of the aromatics that are used as we’re gonna see in this recipe here so let’s get started with some ingredients so of course we’re gonna have some dill pickles these little pickling pickles we have some mustard seed some coriander we’ve got a little

Bit of hot pepper in there that some of our dried hot peppers kosher salt a great deal of kosher salt and as you saw back there we also have some dill tips that’s the seed as its going to seed so first we’re going to start with our

Brine so starting with our kosher salt and about half of our water so we’re going to boil the water with about half of the salt and we’re just gonna make sure that that’s all completely dissolved and then once it is we’re gonna add it back to the cold water that

We have set aside and that will bring the temperature back down faster we don’t want to cook the pickles but we do want our brine to be completely dissolved so we’re just gonna give that a little stir while that is boiling and starting to dissolve we’re gonna give our pickles a wash

Now the fermentation requires the lactobacilli that lives on the outside of produce which is why you want to buy local and why you want to try and get as close to as you can to home imported as sometimes irradiated which destroys the lactobacilli so we do want to give it a

Wash but we don’t want to peel it if we have to peel them usually that means we need some kind of other inoculant but we don’t want bits of dirt in there so please make sure to keep those little end bits all clean any dried-up soil on

There and any dead bits if the little bit of flour is stuck to the one end of the pickle you do want to get rid of that as well yeah just a good solid vegetable brush just to give those a good scrubbing and a good cleaning without peeling them and

That should be just fine of course I’m not gonna show all of that okay so our brine is completely dissolved now you can see it boiling here now we don’t want to boil it away so we’re gonna turn off the heat and we’re gonna add that

Hot brine back to the cold water here’s the water we reserved earlier mixed back with the brine so that is now going to be our Brian we’re just trying to bring that temperature right back down so very easy now all we have left to do is to

Build our jar so we’re gonna pop in one of our two Chili Peppers about half of our aromatics in there so one of our dill heads some of those mustard seeds and coriander seeds and you want to pack these as close as possible I mean keep

Them organized in there you want to be able to keep them as close as you can as much room taking up as possible with your veggies and intersperse your seasonings so you want a little bit on the bottom and then when you do a second layer put a little bit more finish with

A dill head on top as well then once that’s all set and your Rhine is back to room temperature doesn’t have to be chilled but it should be room temperature you’re gonna add that in there and you want to make sure everything is nicely covered in there if

You see one floating to the top just try and tuck it back in underneath the shoulder so that it all stays submerged in there give it a little tap try get rid of any bubbles if there are any and if you need to you can always weigh down

The top most vegetables with we usually use a slice of onion just to keep everything under the brine or cabbage stems are frequently used those are especially popular we’re using make new sauerkraut and that’s it now that’s gonna sit at room temperature for up to a week just to get the fermentation

Started and then you’ll see it start to get a little bit cloudy if you notice the scum forming on the top that’s just a little bit of yeast and you can just scrape that off that is just fine you will see some carbon dioxide bubble up which is why you don’t

Want to lid the pickles really tightly and once the fermentation has started you’re gonna refrigerate those pickles it’ll really slow down the fermentation but keep in mind this is a living fermenting food and the flavor is gonna change slowly as it goes so if there’s a

Cool place like a cell or a basement that’s similar to a fridge it will it will encourage some more fermentation over the time and they can sit in the fridge for a week before they’re really ready to eat and then yeah we eat them with all sorts of things we slice them

Up they go on sandwiches they go on burgers we slice them up and put them in our potato salad in our tuna salad as you’ve seen yeah they have a great lot of usage so if you like this recipe please do like and subscribe and if you have any recipes

That you’d like to see chef Caleb try on the channel please let us know in the comments below and remember to love your food