How to Can Pickles

Learning how to can pickles is one of the best preserves that homesteaders and gardeners can do. These lovely, crispy pickle recipe is the one that you need to help improve your preserving skills.

How to Can Pickles

Canning pickles can take a little time, so allow around 2 hours to complete this recipe. At the end of that time, you will be rewarded with 7 quarts or 14 pints of deliciously, crunchy homemade pickles.

For these pickles, I used packet spice mixes, though you can use your own pickling spices. An easier way to add them to your brine is to tie them up in a piece of cheesecloth or muslin and then remove before adding the brine to your jars.

Crunchy Pickle Tips

To keep your pickles crispy and crunchy:

• Use the freshest cucumbers 
• Cut off the blossom end of the cucumbers before you pickle them
• The temperature of the pickles before canning needs to be cold. You can place them in cold, ice water before you can them.

Which Cucumbers are the Best?

When canning pickles, the best cucumber varieties to use are those that are meant for pickling such as Chicago Pickling Cucumbers. The smaller variety cucumbers are better for crunchy pickles. Cucumbers that are around 6″ (15cm) long are good, especially if you want to pickle them whole.

Ingredients & Supplies

• 9-11 lbs (4-5kg – about 25 Large)  pickling cucumbers 
• 1 Packet of Wages Pickle Mix –  Kosher, Polish, Spicy, Bread & Butter are all good options. Each one has a slightly different recipe, so read the back of the packet before using
• Wages Xtra Crunch Granules – These replace the need for a grape leaf or horseradish leaf and really help with crunchiness.
• White Distilled Vinegar (5% acidity)
• Water
• Canning jars: regular or wide mouth, pint or quart
• Canner
• Canning funnel and canning tongs
• Large saucepan
• Large cooking pot
• Paper towel
• Cutting board and knife

Make Kosher Pickles

• 9-11 lbs (4-5kg – about 25 Large)  pickling cucumbers 
• 3 1/3 cup white distilled vinegar
• 7 1/3 cup water
• 1 pouch Wages Kosher Dill mix

Make Polish Pickles

• 9-11 lbs (4-5kg – about 25 Large)  pickling cucumbers 
• 3 2/3 cup white distilled vinegar
• 7 cup water
• 1 pouch Wages Polish Pickles mix

Instructions for Canning Pickles.

Wash the cucumbers and drain them.

Fill your canner with water and turn on high as it takes a while to get to a boil.

In a large cooking pot, mix together the Wages pickling mix, water, and vinegar according to the directions on the package.

Bring to a boil. Stir constantly until the brining mixture dissolves, then remove the pot from the heat.

Prepare your canning jars by washing them. Have your rings and lids ready. Fill large saucepan ¾ full of water and place on the stove top. Place your clean canning jars upside down in the water, along with the rings and lids. You may only be able to do 2-4 at a time. Make sure to watch the water as it can be sucked up inside the jars. You may need to refill the saucepan as you go. You want to keep your jars hot during this process.

Cut 1/16” (1.5mm) slice off blossom end off cucumbers and discard. You can cut off both ends of the cucumbers if you wish.  Check for any bad spots and cut them off as well. If you are using fresh cucumbers, there shouldn’t be many of these spots. 

Cut cucumbers into pickles and set aside. You can do spears and/or slices. 

Being very careful, use tongs to bring your hot jars and lids to your workspace.

Fill the jars with cucumbers, leaving 1/2” ( 1.27cm) head space.

Place a funnel onto the top of the canning jar and fill with the brining liquid up to 1/2” from the top.

Add the Xtra Crunch granules to each jar. For quart jars, add ¼ teaspoon and for pint jars, add 1/8 teaspoon.

Wipe the rim and jar threads with paper towel to make sure there isn’t any liquid or particles that would prevent a proper seal. Wipe the lids and bands till they are completely dry.

Add the lid and band on the jar and tighten, though not too tight as you will be the bands in 24 hours.

When the water in the canner is at a rolling boil. Use the tongs to place the sealed jars inside. It’s important to do this process with the same size jars, do pints together, and quarts together.

Wait for the water to come to a rolling boil again and then set the timer; 10 minutes for pints and 20 minutes for quarts.

Grab a towel to have it handy when you are ready to remove the jars.  Tis helps with water dripping all over the place.

Use the canning tongs to remove the jars from the water. Gently place the jars onto a cooling rack and listen for them to pop. Then you know they have sealed. Let sit for 24 hours.

After they have sat for 24 hours, double check the top lid by lightly pressing it. If there is no give, they are sealed and you can remove the band and label and store the jars. Don’t stack the jars incase there is leakage or if the lid comes unsealed for some reason.

If you have a jar that doesn’t seal, place in the fridge to use first. You may want to let them marinate for around 1 week before enjoying.

If you end up with extra brining liquid, this can be stored in the fridge for week and can be used to make more pickles when you have a new supply of cucumbers.

Enjoy straight out of the jar or on grilled cheese.

More Recipes

• Refrigerator Pickles
• Refrigerator Bread and Butter Pickles
• Homemade Fermented Carrots
• Fermented Honey Garlic
• Fermented Beets
• Homemade Ginger Kombucha
• How to Make Scrappy Apple Cider Vinegar
• How to Make a Sourdough Starter