I've been bitten by the pickling bug, having bought a case of quart Ball jars and a kit consisting of caps with plugs, fermentation locks and glass weights.
My first attempt came to a sad end. I tried to make sauerkraut in a jar, but I didn't follow any sort of recipe, opting instead to make it the same way my parents did. Except instead of a big wooden barrel, I used one of those quart Ball jars. I think I did a poor job of mashing the chopped cabbage down, because I was not able to generate much liquid from the cabbage. That and the warmth of summer, my cabbage started to mold instead of fermenting.
From there, I tried my hand at pickled cucumbers. I had very little dill weed, so I tried to compensate with other spices, like mustard seed, coriander seed and garlic. I found a recipe online that had vinegar, water, salt and not much else. In retrospect, I wished I has something to make/keep the cucumbers crunchy, but the end result was not too bad. I'm down to my last pickle now.
Today, I murdered a bag of miniature cucumbers and made some cucumber kimchi using a recipe from this video: Easy Korean Spicy Cucumber! I had something much like this at one of the meals at the Black Bear restaurant. I liked that "kimchi" so much that I committed to making a batch of my own. I had just a moment ago done some quality control of my batch, and I pronounce it delicious.
In anticipation of more things to pickle, I've planted a raised bed garden, which circumvents the perpetual problem that I've had with weeds. What I didn't cover with a raised bed, I covered in plastic sheeting and cardboard in hope of killing off the goat weed that's been plaguing my ability to garden. I've planted both some pickling and eating cucumbers, two type of beans (pole and bush), some zucchini, lettuce, beets, tomatoes and broccoli. Hoping for the best. So far, I've harvested a couple of stunted tomatoes and some young zucchini. I'd hate to have to put a price tag on my garden.
