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Grandma's recipe for crunchy Dill Pickles. Using fresh cucumbers, dill, spices, and brine, this flexible recipe follows a simple hot water bath method. Once made, the pickles can be stored for up to a year #lovelygreens #canning #preserving #dillpickles #preservetheharvest #gardenrecipe #kitchengarden #hotwaterbath #cucumberrecipe

Grandma’s Dill Pickle Recipe

Name: Grandma's Dill Pickle Recipe
Prep time: 60 min
Cook time: 15 min
Total time: 75 min
Ingredients: Pickling cucumbers / gherkins; 1 Tbsp Dill leaves (per quart); 1-2 whole Dill flower heads (per quart); 1/2 tsp Peppercorns (per quart); 2 cloves of Garlic (per quart); Water; White vinegar; Sea salt or Kosher salt; Preserving jars & lids

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How to make classic homemade dill pickles using fresh cucumbers, dill, spices, and brine. This recipe follows a simple hot water bath method.

Dill pickles, they’re evocative of my childhood and weekends at Nana’s house. Each summer my grandmother would carry out the ritual of preserving the garden surplus and of everything she made, pickles were my favorite. Her pantry would be filled with bottles showcasing all the colors of the rainbow — red beets, orange carrots, green beans, and more. Without fail, there would always be jars of crunchy gherkins ready for a little blonde headed girl to crack into too. I loved them so much that I’d even sip the brine!

This recipe follows her basic principle of canning pickles with dill, spices, and vinegar. You pack raw gherkins into jars, pour over the homemade brine, and water bath them to sterilize and seal them. Once made, your jars of homemade dill pickles will last about a year.

Recipe for crunchy Dill Pickles — Sliced cucumbers about to be packed into jars

From Garden to Jar

To this day I still enjoy homemade pickles and not just for the nostalgia factor. They’re a relatively simple preserve to make and some of the ingredients are easy to grow in almost any temperate garden. I’ve found that one of the easiest ways that you can grow them is on a DIY Cucumber Pallet Trellis.

For me, they’re one of the best ways as a kitchen gardener to connect the dots between all four seasons. From sowing seeds in the spring to harvesting garlic, dill, and gherkins in the summer, to preserving the lot and enjoying them in the darkest days of winter. Each jar of pickles contains not only a savory treat but also a year’s worth of experiences.

Cucumbers can be grown and outdoors

Some people seem surprised to find that I grow cucumbers outdoors in the Isle of Man. It’s a cool to temperate climate here but I’ve found that some varieties do so well that they can produce mountains of fruit from just a few plants. Marketmore is one of my favorites but there are many varieties of cucumbers and gherkins that are suitable for preserving.

The way I grow my gherkins is by sowing seeds indoors at the end of April and then plant the small plants out into a sunny spot in mid-June. I’ve grown them trained up an old metal headboard before but this year I have them on a pallet cucumber trellis. It’s very easy to build as you can see in the video above.

garlic & dill

For this recipe, I’ve also grown the dill and garlic. In my garden, they can both be ready to harvest at about the same time as the gherkins. Though you can use shop-bought, growing both dill and garlic is relatively easy and you can see my growing tips over here. When it comes to using homegrown dill in pickles, use the flavorsome leaves but add some of the flowers too. Both the flowers and seed have a more intense flavor than dill leaves on their own.