The amount of salt is crucial to proper fermentation. Fermented pickles will be salty, though they shouldn't be "horribly salty."

Is it possible you used table salt? Table salt weighs 10 oz. per cup while canning and pickling salt weighs 7 3/4 oz. per cup, so if table salt was used, the amount of salt by weight would be greater than recommended.

There are other possibilities, but we'd need to know more about the process. Are you eating pickles out of the crock? Refrigerating? Canning? Did you discard the original brine in favor of a finishing brine or strain and use the existing brine?

Carol

This is the main reason I taste the salt brine before adding the cukes. Too much salt gives a very bitter taste, too little salt gives a bland salty taste, just the right amount of salt and water, and your tongue gets 'confused' and senses salt and 'sweet' at the same time. When the salt is in the right proportion, you also get a mouth watering aftertaste. I have never made a bad batch of half sours if I taste the brine and adjust accordingly before adding the cucumbers. Its difficult to tell you any other way of getting to the right salt point, but once you experiment on a very small batch (like half a glass of water size), you should be able to taste test for the right flavor and proprotion of water to salt. I also add garlic and fresh dill to my half sours. I don't really call them 'fermented', as they tend to soften a lot more if they are left out at room temp for too long. I leave the batch out for only a day or two, add a small dash of white vinegar, mix it in, and store the jar in the fridge. This year, I only hope I will be getting some cukes soon.. I use only a single brine, and don't remove or replace it once the cukes are in it. I also never reuse a brine once its had cukes in it, as they give off some 'chemicals' that make further use of the old brine taste odd. To help to correct the salty problem, dump the old brine, make a fresh batch with one quarter the amount of salt, leave them out for a couple of days, and then add the vinegar and refrigerate. If its really way too salty, use only water and a little white vinegar and that should draw out some of the excess salt.

I used Morton Canning & Pickling salt. When they seemed to be done fermenting (began forming yeast on top -- I think it was eight days) I transferred them to smaller containers and popped them in the fridge. They improved after a few days in the fridge, but they still taste more like salt than pickles.

I thought I was supposed to use the old brine -- it never occurred to me to replace it. I won't be heartbroken if I can't recover these pickles, but I'd like to try again with better results.

One problem that we encounter when asking people about the salt is HOW they measure it. Many people use a liquid measuring cup, not a standard dry measuring cup. It does/can make the difference. My husband didn't believe me, so I put measured something and put it in a dry cup, then poured into a clear glass liquid measuring cup. Guess what ?? They were not the same. This is something we go over when we teach classes. Plus, some of those "cutsie" measuring cups and spoons are not accurate.

As some have said, try using a fresh brine and see if it helps.

There was a thread last canning season on the taste of the brine these pickles are cured in. I said to me it tasted "funky" (those chemicals ksrogers mentions) and once the cucumbers are finished, I drain, rinse and place the pickles in a finishing brine. This finishing brine is safe for canning or, of course, could be used with a refrigerated pickle. This is for a large batch. If you decide to try this, you might want to reduce the amount, keeping the proportions the same.

1/2 cup canning and pickling salt
1 quart vinegar
1 gallon water

Heat mixture to boiling and simmer 5 minutes before using.

Carol

Alton Brown had the right idea when he weighs the dry ingredients (his dough recipes). A specific weight for salt would be even better for a dry ingredient compared to a dry measuring cup. Kosher salt has the biggest difference when you dry measure it compared to a fine grained pickling salt. The taste method should still be used before you add the cukes. If its way too bitter with salt, then, you will quickly know and that bitterness can easily be corrected by adding more water if necessary. For an added flavor, a couple or three whole peppercorns can also be put into the brine. Even this slight amount of peppercorns in a half gallon jar of pickles will be noticable and give it just a very slight bite.

Thanks, folks. I'll try the finishing brine. I was going to can them, but that's another story. Maybe next time.

I'd be afraid to use less salt in the fermenting brine, for safety reasons. I found another recipe that didn't call for vinegar, but I wasn't sure I could trust the source, and I don't think that would have helped the salt problem anyway. Anyone have a reliable recipe for fermented pickles?

Canning a ferment pickle in just salt isn't going to be very safe. Thats the reason they sell all those Claussens in the refrigerator case at the supermarkets. The addition of the small amount of vinegar as the fianl step, stops the fermentation process. These should only be stored in the fridge.

I use and have been very happy with a Fermented Dill Pickle recipe from the University of Wisconsin Extension. In fact, the finishing brine I posted is from that recipe. I'm appending a link below. You can also order their brochure, "Homemade Pickles and Relishes" in hard copy, but the link is a pdf document you can print out. It will answer every question you ever had about pickles and some you never thought of.

Carol

Here is a link that might be useful: Homemade Pickles and Relishes

Linda Lou,
I never knew about that difference between dry and wet measure. Thanks. It will undoubtedly save a batch of some good thing in the future.

Julsie,
In addition to the info Carol has given you, I'm providing a link which you might like to see. I haven't used it yet, but based on previous experience with fermented dills, it looks to be reliable.

Keep trying on the fermented dills. To my taste, they are far better than the ones pickled with vinegar. A lactic acid fermentation just has something that vinegar doesn't. I realize that many of the recipes for fermented dills use a small amount of vinegar. I believe that is to tilt the beginning of the fermentation in favor of the good bacteria and away from the bad. Spoilage is definitely a hazard with fermented pickles, so you need to take all precautions against it. The results are worth the effort.

Jim

Here is a link that might be useful: Fermented Garlic Dill Pickles

"I'd be afraid to use less salt in the fermenting brine, for safety reasons."

It's neither the salt nor the vinegar which preserved a fermented pickle. It's the lactic acid produced by the lacobacillus bacteria during fermentation.

The purpose of the salt is to set up the proper conditions for lactobacillus to thrive and carry out the fermentation. So the amount of salt is critical. Use neither too much nor too little. Follow a reliable recipe.

Sauerkraut, kim chee and other fermented vegetables use the same process and result in foods having some of the same flavor notes. Most of these products use no vinegar. And, as you have noted, some recipes for fermented dills use not vinegar. These products are not preserved by pickling in vinegar is not needed to make them safe. As I said in my previous post, I believe some recipes use a small amount of vinegar to create an acid condition initially which favors the propagation of the good (lactic) bacteria. The quicker a large population of good bacteris is created, the less chance of spoilage bacteria gaining a foothold.

There have been health claims made for consumption of foods made by lactobacillus fermentation of vegetables. I don't know it they are right, but I enjoy the foods so much that I choose to believe them.

Jim

Jim, thanks for sharing that link. Lots of good stuff there. I have to say I never was a big "fan" of homemade dills until I started my own fermented dills. What a huge difference in flavor. Now I'm hooked. For the fall project I'd like to try a sauerkraut from a Dutch recipe that uses red cabbage and buttermilk (speaking of lactobacillus).

Carol

Jim and Carol, thanks for those links! There's a lot of information there that I didn't know.

It's the strangest thing, yesterday when I got out the pickles to move them to a finishing brine, my husband and I tasted one and agreed that it wasn't as bad as they'd been the day before. So I moved half to a finishing brine and left the other half as they were. Today, hubby tried one of each, and said they tasted the same as each other, but better than the one he tried yesterday. So maybe I'm just impatient, and I should let them sit a while longer? Does that sound right?

I didn't realize that the vinegar in the brine wasn't strictly necessary for fermentation, I just knew that I didn't know enough to try it without a recipe! It seems like the pickles weren't ready yet when I moved them to the fridge, but I didn't think you were supposed to leave them out once they started producing scum yeast. Any insight?

Julie

Aha, that explains a lot. Yes, it does sound as if you may have jumped the gun. The number of days to readiness will vary depending upon temperature, locality, etc. And by the way, I hope it's not too warm where you're curing your pickles. Temperature has a lot to do with success. It's kind of like Goldilocks, not too hot and not too cold but just right.

Here's a fermentation sequence Linda Lou provided last year that may help you.

Fermentation sequence
1. Clear brine - no cloudiness for 1 to 3 days
2. Cloudy brine with gas formation, 2-3 days
3. Cloudy brine - no gas formation, 5 to 6 days

My notes from last year show that I canned my pickles on the 17th day. It varies, but that shows you the process can stretch out a while. If it's cooler the process is slower, warmer it's faster.

Carol

My house is on the warm side, but I fermented the pickles in the coolest corner I could find. I put them in the fridge when there were no more bubbles forming -- guess I was supposed to wait 5-6 days from that point. Oops.

A ferment can take as long as 3-4 weeks for full development. Under some conditions 8 weeks would not be unusual. In fact, I thought mine were speedy at 17 days. I value Linda Lou's fermentation sequence more as a reminder of what I'll see at the various stages than for the specific # of days. It's also why I keep notes each year, so that I have good reminders the next season of what I did and what I observed. We don't pickle regularly, so it's easy to forget.

You can get good pickles as long as the temperature isn't above 80 or below 55. 70 is about ideal; lower temperatures slow fermentation but that's not as big a concern as higher temps which can lead to spoilage.

When the pickles are completely cured, they'll be a translucent olive green. I wouldn't try reading through them, LOL, but you will see a definite difference in the flesh if you cut one.

Carol

My half sours that are refrigerated for over 6 months get that translucent appearance too. The room temp fermenting is only a day or two, and then I add the dash of vinegar and place in the fridge. They last me up to a year if I don't gobble them up sooner. A slice with a hotdog and roll is a great way to enjoy them too.

I have used two recipes for vinegar-free fermented pickles and loved both. Jim is right that vinegar tips the balance in your favor, and of course botulism is one of the guys vying for dominance in the crock, so I pickle meticulously and I always taste these pickles when they're done, before I share with consenting adults. Do what you're comfortable with. I never process these, just keep in quart jars in the fridge till they're gone.

Here is one of the recipes. The other is found in a forum at the link below, which goes to page 2 of the discussion. Page 1 can be accessed at the bottom of the thread.

Melissa

from Linda Ziedrich's The Joy of Pickling:

Half-sours aren't pickles taken prematurely from their brine; rather, they're cured quickly in a low-salt brine, which hastens the fermentation so the pickles never get very sour, no matter how long they remain in the brine. In The Dill Crock (1984), John Thorne describes half-sours as "cucumbers still, not pickles-little cucumbers who [have] died and gone to heaven."

Makes 1 Quart

1. Put the peppercorns, coriander, bay, and garlic into a quart jar. Gently wash the cucumbers, and remove the blossom ends. Pack the jar with the cucumbers, adding the dill head and chile pepper. Add the salt to the water, and pour the brine over the cucumbers, leaving 1 1/2 inches headspace. Push a quart freezer bag into the mouth of the jar, and pour the remaining brine into the bag. Seal the bag. Keep the jar at room temperature, with a dish underneath if the seeping brine might do some damage otherwise.

2. Within 3 days you should see tiny bubbles rising in the jar; this means that fermentation has begun. If scum forms on top of the brine, skim it off daily, and rinse off the brine bag. lf so much brine bubbles out that the pickles aren't well covered, add some more brine made in the same proportion of salt to water.

3. The pickles should be ready within a week, when they taste sour and when the tiny bubbles have stopped rising. Skim off any scum at the top of the jar, cap the jar, and store the pickles in the refrigerator for about 3 days, after which time they should be olive-green throughout.

They are best eaten within about 3 weeks.

Here is a link that might be useful: pickle discussion and recipe

Apologies for the bad cut & paste. Here are the ingredients for the Joy of Pickling recipe.

1/4 teaspoon black peppercorns, crushed
1/4 teaspoon coriander seeds, crushed
1 bay leaf
1 garlic clove, chopped
1 quart 3- to 5-inch pickling cucumbers
1 dill head
1 chile pepper, slit lengthwise
1 1/2 tablespoons pickling salt
3 cups water

OK sorry for the multiple postings, but rereading the ingredients for the Joy of Pickling recipe, I'm not sure I'd consider it safe with less salt. Half-sour pickles are best made by stopping the fermentation halfway through. Mine turned out ok, but if there's a one in a million chance of making a safe product, no sense being one of the 999,999 failures. I recommend the second recipe which has about 3/4 c salt to about 1 gallon water. As Ken said, the brine should taste sweet, as opposed to just salty which indicates too much or too little salt. Pickle safely!

Melissa

Okay, now I'm just getting more and more confused. Melissa's recipe said that they should be done when the tiny bubbles stop rising, but mine clearly weren't. When I cut them, only the outside edges were that translucent green color, and they tasted kind of sour, but they mostly tasted BAD. They've continued changing in color and taste since I put them in the fridge -- but what would have happened if I'd processed them? I'd like to can the next batch, simply because we may-or-may-not be moving in the next few months, so anything I can make shelf-stable is more valuable to us right now.

If I understand it correctly, Melissa and Ken are talking about half sour pickles, which are something different from what Carol, Linda Lou and I are talking about.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Jim

Julsie, Jim is right that the tiny bubbles recipe is for half sour pickles, which are more green & crunchy. I'm not sure I trust that recipe. I use the recipe in my link and I stop the fermentation early, but those don't taste bad to me. Now if you don't like half sours, you might be unpleasantly surprised if you eat them at that stage.

This is just a guess, but I think when the fermentation stops, there is enough lactic acid in there to fully cure the pickles if you can them in the original brine. It would be kind of like regular fresh-pack pickles which need a few weeks to finish pickling in the jar. Maybe try a small batch to test it? But since they improved after sitting in the fridge (no more fermentation in there), I think they would also improve sitting in sealed jars at room temperature. In that case I would not change brines unless you're following a recipe that says so.

Melissa

No wonder I'm lost! LOL! Turns out my recipe was the exact same one Carol linked from the U-Wisconsin Extension, only I got it from some other extension website.

Just so I have this straight: for a fully-fermented pickle (never heard of a half-sour until I got here) -- it's supposed to taste wrong when the fermentation stops, but if I can them in their own brine, they'll finish curing in the jars.

Is that right? It doesn't seem right to me, but we've already established that I don't know what I'm doing.

Julie

Melva, Actually I beg to differ on the brine being the same as a fully fermented. Half sours are just a less salty brine and works very well to avoid an extra salty pickle. After just a single day at room temp, I add the neccesary dash of white vinegar and then they go in the fridge. I do use lots of fresh dill weed and seed heads as well as plenty of garlic cloves. Mine can stay in the fridge without any scum or spoilage of any kind, up to a full year. I don't add bay leaves or any other spices, but occaisionally I will add a couple of whole peppercorns. I do not remove or replace the brine at any time during storage in the fridge, but do toss out the brine once the cukes are consumed. I have also added a few cukes to the brine, but only for a few days after making the initial batch. After a week, I start up a new brine for a new batch. I don't really care for the fuly fermented cukes as they just seem too salty for me, even if I tried to use less salt, or replace the brine once its fermented and spent. I guess its what you like in a fermented pickle. Claussen types that are referred to as 'half sours' are made the same as I do mine, but they have a special vacuum process when they are commerically made, but they also need refrigeration even during their storage in supermarkets. Without refrigeration, gasses would build up and blow up the jars or the seals

I do not 'can' mine, as they are not safe to can. If they were, I doubt if the firm texture would be anything close to what you began with.

And actually I beg to differ with Ken, if he is advising that the answer for you, and the SALTY pickle problem is to make half sours instead of the fermented dills you wanted to make. I think you will get what you wanted if you follow the directions of either of two web sites regarding fermented pickles. They will not be exessively salty and will be fully fermented. Remember Linda Lou's tip on dry vs. wet measure. Use her guide (Which Carol provided) concerning the stages of fermentation.

If you want to make a Klausen style pickle, the exact instructions are somewhere on this forum I believe. Do a search of the forum. If you don't find it, I can provide it. Klausen sells a pretty good pickle. It is probably the best to be found in a supermarket, but IMO does not equal a fermented garlic dill.

Good luck.

Jim

Jimster- I believe its spelled Claussen, with a 'C'.. Unless that name is a German title? Fermented fully or not, they may not be as tasty as ones with less chemical activity from a long fermentation and extra salt. What happens if they are tightly capped and the fermentation is still going on- BOOM??

1. to Julsie:
I agree with Jim, follow a tested recipe and wait it out. Carol mentions waiting 17 days and thinking that was fast, so as far as I can tell, the answer to your question is YES, it's ok for them to taste bad/salty right when they stop. Just be sure the fermentation is done before canning, as Ken says. Or if you have a few months till moving, wait till they're cured before canning them.

2. to Ken:
Thanks for the brine info. I agree that a less salty brine is safe for one day on the counter, no scum. Do you think the Joy of Pickling recipe I posted is safe--less salt, a week on the counter with daily skimming? About the gases, I guess that is why sometimes half sours in the Ba-Tempte jar on at a pickle bar are mushy--the gases might be getting forced into the pickle. When I bought a jar of Ba-Tempte half sours, some of them were mushy enough to seem spoiled, which made them unappetizing. I think I will stick with cutting off the fermentation early. They cured up not too salty, but not too sour either. If I can get into NYC next time I visit my parents, I will hit the pickle district and ask questions. :-)

Melissa

I hope Ken comes on and gives you an answer. I'd be interested in hearing his thoughts on this.

I have Joy of Pickling and have used it quite a bit, though not for the half-sours you mention. For what it's worth, in her forward Ziedrich credits Nellie Oehler, a home economist with Oregon State University Extension (Ziedrich's a fellow Oregonian) and Kenneth Hall, Ph.D. and professor emeritus of food science at the University of Connecticut for reviewing her script.

It's not infallible, as something might have slipped through, but I'd be inclined to trust her recipes.

Carol

"I will hit the pickle district"

Melissa, tell us more about the pickle district. I want to go there. Probably can have a lot of fun for much less than the cost of a Broadway show.

Jim

Anyplace where you see a crowded Jewish deli is a good spot for pickles. When my grandmother made the salt brine type, she wouldn't bother with refriigeration at all. Of course my grandfather wouldn't let them stay around for more than a week anyway. They were from the 'old country', Poland, and my grandfather was a baker and had his own bakery in VT many years ago. When we visted as kids, we would raid the bakery as our first visit. That Joy of Pickling recipe has very little salt. I cannot tell exactly what I use here, but I will usually use about 1/4 to 1/2 cup of salt for making a half gallon jar of pickles. If I want a quicker flavor, I give them two days on the counter, then in the fridge they go. I prefer to add the small amount of vinegar then, as it seems to round out the taste some. The half gallon jar may have a bit over a quart of water added. I don't add anything else but plenty of dill (al forms), and some garlic cloves cut up. Every cuke gets both its ends cut off, as this removes any of the possible bitterness a stem or blossom end might have. Anyone for cold beet soup (Borshe). I make that in the summer too. It uses the same dill, cukes, scallions, beet greens and beets. The secret ingredient is beef broth. What a great summer cold soup served with a nice sour rye bread..

There's a pickle district! Wow, that city is amazing.

"Sure, he's made three-quarter sours, but he can't make a full sour." Direct quote from linked article about NY pickles. :-)

The pickle district is on the lower east side, including Guss Pickles on Essex Street. This is maybe 15 blocks south of where the Second Avenue Deli was, I think 10th & 2nd. They had spectacular pickles on the table, but even there the half sours were sometimes soft. There's a Guss Pickles entry at wikipedia.org.

Thanks Carol and Ken for your opinion on the lower-salt recipe. I'll try it later this summer for comparison to cutting off the other recipe halfway through. Carol, your opinion of authors means a lot to me so thanks for your frequent advice.

Melissa

Here is a link that might be useful: pickle wars

Melissa, it's probably "information overload" by this point. You might want to try just a very small batch of the half-sours and see how you like them. There's always another pickle recipe/method out there if that one doesn't suit you.

Carol

Another suggestion, if your pickles are bland, or lack a good dill flavor. I have used some of the Mrs. Wages and Ball pickle mixes which are mostly salt. These also have oils of dill and other extracts that are much stronger flavored than what you would get from regular fresh or dried dill. A few times I made half sours out of these mixes, they were really good tasting. Although they tend to use Tumeric as a yellowish color, the flavor of dill comes through and with them, I don't need to use as much regular dill seed heads or the weed. They do, however benfit by adding some garlic. Tonight, I finished up last years batch and found about 10 cloves of pickled garlic at the bottom of the jar. I chopped these up, and was amazed that they were still quite firm. They went well in a green salad with some grape tomatoes.

I also just tasted a fully fermented pickle from a recipe I found online. They tasled like I stuck my tongue in a salt shaker. They have been fermenting for 3 wks. They bubbled and formed scum and stopped bubbling a few days ago. I dont know, should I just scap them? I cant believe for a second this is how they are supposed to taste. I don't know what to do!

What amounts of salt and water did you use? I'm not saying they were wrong, just curious.

Jim

It could be that yours are a bit too salty. Soaking a couple of days in a more diluted salt brine, might help to reduce the saltiness. If I were to have that problem, they would most certainly be soaked in a much more watery brine, and then add a dash of vinegar to them. After that, they can be refrigerated, or canned in a similar lower salt brine.

My first batch of fermented pickles came out horribly salty too...so salty I threw them out, actually, as soaking didn't seem to help.

I tried a different recipe for this batch, and they came out better...more sour, less salty (although still pretty salty). But, I wasn't happy with using the brine when I canned because first, it seemed like too much evaporation had occurred, and second, because I had been less than successful at skimming the white stuff off the top and it got all mixed in. This recipe had me use a weighted plate to hold the pickles down, but with only a heavy towel rather than plastic...hence the evaporation, I guess.

Anyway, I made a fresh brine from another recipe...2 3/4 c vinegar, 3 c water & 1/4 c pickling salt, and canned them in that with some more spices & garlic.

However, I didn't have enough, so I made another batch, and this time I accidentally put 1/4 c sugar instead of the salt! I decided to leave it in, to see if the sugar might counteract some of the salty flavor, and added the 1/4 of salt as well. I only canned one jar with that brine...the rest went into a jar in my fridge for eating this winter.

But now I'm worried that the added sugar might make that one processed jar unsafe?

Carol, the URL you posted a couple of years ago is no longer working -- is this the PDF you were referring to on 7/2/06 at 14:07?

Here is a link that might be useful: pickle pdf

No, though the one you linked to comes from the same source. Your link is an abbreviated version with just a few selected recipes.

Here's a link to the original document I mentioned in 2006. They changed the URL. Typical. It's fortunate this document is still online. Be sure to download it to your computer before this link also breaks.

Carol

Here is a link that might be useful: Homemade Pickles and Relishes

Reiterate.. TASTE YOUR BRINE before you use it in your canning!!

I make my sour pickles using the recipe at the site Carol has above. When I take them from the crock, I soak them in water for 24 hour's and I change the water with new about 4 times in the time period. Mine are never "too" salty. The salt is crucial and this is what gives them that sour flavor. I have made 4 batches of 30 lbs this year. Gifts for my family and friends. I have three refrigerators and STILL don't have enough room for everything! My mom blessed me with 2 huge, 15 gallon crocks. We had a cattle ranch in the desert and had olive trees. My mom fermented olives which takes a long time! I always remember those crocks sitting in our small rock house that my mom used for storage & which stayed about 60 degrees all the time. We kids liked to go in their in the summer and read a book because it was always nice and cool.

I am trying to make my second batch of pickles.First batch were great.They were refrigerated garlic dill pickles.Do I leave them out for a day,then refrigerate or what ?

As a little girl in NY I remember eating SALTY dill pickles.I can't find them anywhere or get a recipe for them. Can you help me
Thanks
Jody

have made several attempts at sour pickles. the mustard recipe is great but the vinegar recipe(s) are too salty. i hesitate to cut back on the salt as i understand it is crucial to the fermentation process, they also are not sour enough. any suggestions would be appreciated.

I tried making fermented pickles and found they were too salty for me, even with the low-salt brine. That's why I switched to making pickles canned in vinegar and water. It's true that they don't have the lactobacillus. But they don't have the salt either, since in the recipes I have been using, it's just for taste if it's there at all. I was just reading a study that said that eating vinegar with meals helps lower blood sugar, which just encourages me to make more pickles. :)

My Mom used to make quarts of pickles everyday as the cukes came on. She would just clean the cukes add salt and spices and garlic. Pour water over them and put them away after a few days of turning them over. They were the best. My question is, do you think that she sealed the lids? Like canning? I know that she never used a water bath. She stored them in the basement.

Can't say what Mom used to do but many did store their fully fermented pickles in the cellar or a root cellar because the temps there were about the same as fridge temps 40-45 or even cooler in the winter. But even then they won't store for long so they'd need to be eaten within a reasonable length of time.

Now days the guidelines read: Fully fermented pickles may be stored in the original container for about 4 to 6 months, provided they are refrigerated and surface scum and molds are removed regularly. Canning fully fermented pickles is a better way to store them.

So processing them after they are fully fermented allows for longer shelf storage and it also eliminates the need to skim them every few days since the processing prevents any molds, listeria or yeasts from developing.

Here is a link that might be useful: Fermented Dill Pickles instructions