Quick Dill Refrigerator Pickles

This comes from Rachael Ray and is SO good to use up those fresh cucumbers that my neighbor brings me from her garden!

Quick Pickles
1/2 cup white vinegar, eyeball it
2 rounded teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon mustard seed
1 teaspoon salt
1 clove cracked garlic
1 teaspoon dried dill or 2 tablespoons fresh dill leaves, chopped or snipped
1 bay leaf
4 kirby cucumbers, cut into 1-inch slices on an angle

Directions
Heat small saucepan over medium high heat. Add vinegar, sugar, mustard seed, salt, and garlic to the pan and cook until it begins to simmer and sugar dissolves. Toss the dill, bay leaf, and sliced cucumbers together in a heat-proof bowl. Pour the simmering liquid over the cucumbers and stir to evenly coat. Allow to cool to room temperature or chill before serving.

Pickled Asparagus

When I was a child, we visited my grandma often.  She was an avid canner and her specialty was pickles!  And not just your regular run of the mill pickles (though she did those too and they were awesome), but she also pickled beans, a delicacy that you just can't buy in a store.  Years later, my sister Lyndsay took that one step further and pickled asparagus.  Since asparagus is so abundant where we live, it was an instant hit.  Recently, I was given a huge bucketful of asparagus from my amazing sister-in-law and so I decided to try my luck at canning and here is what turned out!

Pickled Asparagus

Source: Lyndsay

4 lbs. green or yellow beans (or asparagus)

8 cloves garlic (or more if you really like pickled garlic)

4 C. white vinegar

1 tsp. red hot pepper flakes

8-16 heads fresh dill

1/2 C. pickling or canning salt

4 C. water

Wash & snap beans (or asparagus).  In each jar, place 1-2 dill heads and 1 clove of garlic.  Place whole beans (or asparagus) upright in jars leaving 1/2" headspace.  Combine salt, vinegar, water, and pepper flakes - bring to a boil.  Add hot solution to beans leaving 1/2" headspace.  Adjust lids & process 25 minutes in a boiling water canner.

*So just a few explanations on her directions, mostly to myself, as I felt like Amelia Bedelia through the whole canning process.  First off, did you know that a clove of garlic is just one piece off the head of garlic?  After all this time, and I have claimed to love cooking so much, I am just now figuring this out.  So, I happened to buy 8 HEADS of garlic rather than just the 1-2 cloves I would have needed.  Needless to say, I am becoming acquainted with fresh garlic in my cooking and it is terrific!  Second of all, I searched the whole grocery store before the produce guy told me that they don't sell fresh dill and he had to go in the back and get me some dried dill that he says "everyone" knows you use in canning.  And third of all, I had to double the recipe for the brine to make enough to use the whole batch of asparagus.  And finally, fourth of all, you have to wait a couple of weeks to let these pickle before you eat them.  Not a happy thought when you spent all day and want to sample the fruit of your labors.  But the good news is that they keep for years and get better over time... so enjoy!



Seasoned Potato Skin Wedges

 These are seriously so yummy and so easy!

Seasoned Potato Skin Wedges

From: Family Fun

Family Fun had these in their Halloween edition several years back, but they were way too good to eat just at Halloween time!

Ingredients:

Washed, unpeeled potatoes

Olive oil
Seasoned salt
Onion powder
Garlic Salt
Sour Cream
Scallions (opt.) *I sprinkled mine with chives instead.*

Directions:
1.  Cut each potato lengthwise into 1/4-1/2" slabs.  (If you want to make a ghost shape, you can cut one end of each slab.)

2. Grease a baking sheet and lay the potato slabs on it (pieces with skin go skin side down).  Brush the top of each slab with olive oil and season with seasoned salt, onion powder, and garlic salt.  (suggestion: combine 1 tsp of each spice in a bowl, then sprinkle about 1/8 tsp of the mixture over each slab.)

3.  Bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes.

4.  Remove the potatoes from the oven and cool for 10 minutes, then "frost" them with sour cream and sprinkle with chives.  (For ghost potatoes, arrange the scallions...or olives, or chives, or whatever you choose to make a spooky ghost face.)

Here is my very sad attempt to make my potato look ghosty with chives.  It would be way more awesome with olives or scallions!