I sometimes have to rinse the cucumbers off, but it is more like the third day. I think they will be fine.
Ah, we all obsessed at first. Nowdays I am too tired and also have been doing this for so many years, I can almost can in my sleep. That is what I should be doing now, sleeping.
I remember summer camp. You need a break sometimes, even though you miss the kids.
Good luck with your pickles ! I love them. Hey, I better, LOL !

The youngest three will still be home (boys, 2, 4, and 6 yrs. old.) So I will be missing the older ones (10 yr. old boy and 8 yr. old girl) AND not getting a break. Wouldn't trade my life with anyone. And I know that camp will be the most fun they have ever had!

The only reason I'm up is that I'm waiting (and WAITING) for the load of t-shirts to dry. They leave Sunday morning, and we're packing tomorrow.

Glad to know that I still have a chance at doing the pickles well. So like me to overload my "plate!"

Thanks LL!

Helen

Helen, if my water gets really "scummy", I rinse the cucumbers too. Eh. It's never made a difference, I eat the darned things right out of the bucket once they get to the syrup stage!

Annie

Would a piece of muslin work to make the spice bag?

More importantly, does the spice bag stay with the syrup at all times; in with the pickles, back out when you heat the syrup up again, then finally removed for good before processing?

I think a piece of muslin would work for your spice bag, and yes, mine stays in the syrup, through heating, etc., until time to can the pickles.

Annie

Yes, I sew little spice bags out of muslin. I do keep it in the syrup the whole time, even during reheating. A large stainless teaball works well, too.
My friend made the mistake of just dumping the spices in the syrup, no bag. But, then... don't get me started on her canning things, LOL !

I didn't have apple cider vinegar either! Or enough sugar! LOL! And since I wasn't even sure I had any clean muslin (oh I am so funny!) as long as I was at the all night grocery store, I got the cheesecloth. (The stock boys smiling oblivion was very amusing. "*cheese* cloth?")

The syrup's in there people. The cucumber chunks do not want to let me weigh them down, do they? I'm doing it in a giant glass jar so I shoved a plastic funnel in there to hold them down, then a ziploc with some water to displace enough syrup to cover the uppermost. Then the cloth over the top to keep out the cat hair ;-)

And isn't it funny that I backed these guys up to a reasonable hour and now I am back at 11 p.m.? I think this is a hoot! Except I am tired.

When I use spices for pickling and just want the flavors, I just pour them into the boiling vinegar, and allow them to simmer about an hour. Then, I pour out the mixture into a sieve to get out the larger bits, then through a second sieve that has a much finer mesh that will remove most of the smaller stuff, except maybe fine sediment.

I used this method to make a batch of mustard pickles, and used both yellow and brown mustard seeds ground up. After an hour of simmering, they were easy to remove. Then I added the necessary salt, Splenda, ground yellow mustard powder, a small jar of yellow mustard, and a little garlic. The brine was also colored with some tumeric for that necessary bright yellow color. The jars were tightly packed with cukes, sweet red and green pepper pieces, cauliflower, whole small onions. Because these tend to shrink a little, I placed the packed jars in the microwave to heat them up a little before filling them with the mustard sauce. This helped to give them a bit more space for packing in a few more. Next, I added a thickener to make a mustard sauce. I used a National Starch sample called 'Prema 300' which is designed for use in low pH foods and is used by the canning industry (like Clear Jel). It was a sauce, so it needed to be poured in the packed jars slowly, using the bubble freer that Ball 'accessory'. The pickles were processed for 25 minutes as quarts and 20 minutes as pints. I felt that because of the sauce, it was necessary to have a little longer process time. There was no water added, only white, and cider vinegar, as well as a little white wine vinegar (also 5%). The chunks were a bit smaller than for Lind Lou's recipe. Its my first batch of Mustard pickle in over 20 years and the mustard sauce is really nice tasting on its own. I still have a quart of the mustard sauceleft, so will use the rest to make a few more jars when I get more cukes.