bread & butter refrigerator pickles

i was super excited last saturday when i saw these beauties at the public market for $1.

it's finally cucumber season. and with cucumber season comes pickles. only i couldn't decide which ones to make. traditional dill? bread & butter? super garlic dill? sweet? they all sounded good so the decision came down to one thing: jason. after 2 seconds of thought he decided bread & butter all the way. there's no way i was going to can my first round of pickles. i needed a good refrigerator recipe. lucky for me, smitten kitchen made some last month from her farmer's market cukes (hey, how'd she get cucumbers a month before me?!)

with recipe in hand, i set out to cut up the cukes & onion. stupidly, i used the slicing blade for my food processor to whiz through all six cukes and 2 small onions in 2 minutes. smart because it only took a couple minutes. stupid because they came out way way way too thin. next time i'll take the extra couple minutes to hand slice the cukes into thicker slices.

once the cucumbers and onions are sliced, pickles couldn't be easier. mix them up with some salt in a large bowl. cover with ice and let sit about 2 hours.

when the cukes & onions have about 15 minutes left to sit, start making the pickling liquid. it's a simple sweetened and spiced up (turmeric, mustard, coriander and celery seed) vinegar mixture. bring it to a boil and remove from heat.

drain the cucumbers and onion (don't rinse) and add to the liquid. stir thoroughly and place into a quart jar. refrigerate. we let them sit in the refrigerator over night before eating like crazy. if you make them in the morning, i'm sure you could have some for the night's dinner.

...and i never realized tumeric is the big flavor difference between these and sweet/dill pickles (and adds the characteristic yellow color). interesting. never would have guessed that.

easy bread & butter refrigerator pickles
get the recipe at smitten kitchen