Crock-fermented Pickles, A Study

2023-07-11 Batch

The Ingredients

According to The Noma Guide to Fermentation, I aimed for a 2% salt solution by weight. Here's a breakdown of the 2023-07-11 inaugural attempt; I noted everything by cumulative weight as I added things to the crock.

Results

Meh! No great shakes this attempt.

They're sufficiently sour pickles, but nothing really stands out in a positive way. Something I likely should have done was trimmed the flower end, as I've since read. A few of the pickles have been nice and firm on on one end, and then hollow out and get soft toward what I'm assuming is the flower end.

The pickles were allowed to ferment for 14 days with minimal intervention. There was one instance where I saw some debris in the water lock of the crock, so I opened it up to clean that out. While in there I scooped a bit of the brine off the top as it was at the lip of the vessel. I didn't observe any mold or growth.

Another somewhat odd characteristic is that the I can sometimes pull the skin off like peeling a glove, leaving behind intact meat, with a little pickle-skin thimble. I think that's because of the cucumbers used, which definitely were more thick-skinned to begin with.

No noticeable heat from the jalapeño, so next time maybe throw a few in there for good measure... reminder to taste a bit of it to inform the decision of how many to add.

So yeah, I've been eating them since Tuesday and I haven't gotten sick, so... win?

2023-07-29 Batch

The Ingredients

The first batch was adequately sour, but nothing to write home about. This time I'm trying a riff on the Serious Eats Lacto-Fermented Dill Pickle recipe, but I couldn't find some of the ingredients. I used homegrown (well, someone else's home) pickles sliced pretty thickly on a mandolin I kinda broke the thing off of. Terrifying experience as always.

Results

This was... disgusting. Very impressive looking: vibrant, colorful, looked great in the vessel, but ultimately not a good flavor and awful texture. This sat in the fridge for a week or two while I decided what to do. I threw it away.

2023-08-26 Batch

The Ingredients

Went back to Noma...ish. This time throwing in some heat and a lemon slice to see if there's an improvement. Still using the same small cucumbers from Wegmans even though a few got weird in the first batch. I used some home-grown cucumbers in the second batch that were probably on their last legs, and theu pretty much turned to mush.

Results

This one was a big disappointment: the flavor was pretty good, but the texture was... nonexistent.

These cucumber hunks became mush, pretty much only the skins.

I strained everything out and reserved the brine as a starter for the next batch.

On them turning to mush, I think the kitchen was a little too warm. We hit a hot spell and the air conditioning may not have been adequate. The fermentation station was also on the back corner of the counter, but I wonder if it's too close to the dishwasher, which definitely produces heat.

Add to this I don't think there were any real tannic ingredients I keep reading about, either grape leaves or tea mostly. Something to consider next time.

2023-09-09 Batch

The Ingredients

Hot on the heels of the previous failure, got a bunch of cucumbers from the Farmer's Market in town. Going to backslop a bit with the previous brine, and I bought grape leaves, though I'm dubious that's the same thing I've been reading about. I guess I expected dried leaves like a bay leaf, but I got big, make-a-Greek-treat grape leaves I'd expect to stuff with rice... which I don't hate the idea of, but I digress.

Then I remembered I have some turmeric green tea bags, so I decided to toss one of those in instead.

Also, going to stop sooner this time. Maybe only one week.

Results

TBD