This recipe takes at least 16 hours to get them into the jars and cooling.
Sweet Pickles:
clean unpeeled cucumbers. with the ends cut off and sliced into 1/4in slices
Place cucumber slices into a stainless steel, plastic or glass bowl (no other metal except stainless steel)
Cover cucumber slices with Lime solution. Mae more than 1 batch of lime solution to cover your amount of cucumber slices.
Lime Solution
½ cup pickling lime
1 gallon of water
Mix until lime is dissolved completely.
Put a plate on the slices to keep them beneath the lime solution Add a jar filled with water, on top of the plate, to weigh the slices if neecesary.
Soak cucumber slices for at least 12 hours. Drain the lime water off the cucumbers, and rinse them thoroughly, at least 3 times.
Cover the slices with ice water and soak them for at least 3 hours,, adding ice as it melts.
Sweet Brine
For every 7 cups of cucumber slices, mix:
9 cups of sugar
8 cups of vinegar
1 Tablespoon salt
1 Tablespoon pickling spice in a spice bag, muslin, or cheesecloth (I used a coffee filter all tied up with thread.
In a pan Heat until all the sugar is dissolved, and solution is hot. Add cucumber slices and bring to a medium boil
Boil until the center begins to lose the white color and turns more clear.
Leave the heat on the pan while you jar the hot pickles and brine into hot jars with hot lids. Make some extra sweet brine to add to the jars if needed.
The original recipe said to put the lids and rings on tightly, and then wrapping the jars in towels to keep them hot longer, letting them cool down over about 6-8hours. My mom said this prevents drafts from sealing the jars too quickly.
I didn’t do this. I brought the cucumber slices and brine just to a boil, and then ladled them into the jars(fingertip tight lids). and processed them in a waterbath canner for 10 mnutes, letting the canner sit for 10 miuntes with the heat turned off, before opening the lid, and letting it sit another 5 minutes, and then removing the jars. This way my pickles followed the basic guidelines from my mom and grandma, while adding the modern canning techniques to ensure safety.
