Sour Dill Pickles

This recipe takes only 2-3 months.  

First, go to the nursery, and buy four to six cucumber plants.  Plant, nurture, and wait until you have cucumbers.

In all seriousness, I like to grow cucumbers every spring and make my own pickles.  I can occasionally find kirby cucumbers in the grocery store (and it's even harder to find the right plants - you need the smaller cucumbers for pickling).  It's a two day recipe, though, so be prepared.

Once you have cucumbers and ingredients in hand, this is a pretty quick recipe other than the wait time in between steps.  Sometimes, it's harder for me to find the fresh dill than to actually do the recipe.  I've done this once with dried dill weed, and it just wasn't the same.

I have to attribute Jim Fobel for this recipe - his cookbook is called Jim Fobel's Big Flavors.   I've found that this makes very crunchy crispy sour dills.  Many pickle recipes have you cooking and doing the traditional canning process, but I think that gives you the softer pickles that I don't like as much.  Be cautioned, however, that these must be refrigerated immediately and last just six months to a year.  I seem to have a problem where they last only a few weeks, as they get eaten pretty quickly.

Ingredients

• 2 pounds kirby cucumbers (8 to 12)
• 1/2 cup pickling salt / kosher salt - basically any salt without iodine added
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 tsp coriander seeds
• 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes
• 1 cup cider vinegar
• 3 large garlic cloves
• 1/2 cup fresh dill or 1 tbsp dried dill weed
• 1 tsp dill seeds

First you want to brine the pickles - make sure they've been well rinsed - add the salt to five cups of tap water and stir to dissolve the salt.  You need to find a bowl where the pickles can be submerged completely in this mixture.  I use a couple of big souflee dishes and put a plate on top to keep the cucumbers down.

Brine for two days.

Once this exercise is complete, heat up some of the ingredients in a sauce pan - 1 cup water, 1 tablespoon salt, the bay leaves, coriander, and pepper flakes.  Bring to a boil, and then let it cool to room temperature.   This may be an hour or two later, so wait until you're ready to complete the recipe to remove the cucumbers from the brine and rinse them well.

Slice the garlic, and set aside with the fresh dill.  Mix all of the remaining ingredients in a bowl with 2 cups cold water.   I use 1 quart mason jars, and I pack the soon-to-be pickles, garlic, and dill weed in the jars, then pour the liquid into them to fill them up.   This recipe will make about two jars - I frequently halve it and make one jar at a time, based on my cucumber yield. Refrigerate.

Lastly, if you grow your own, what you can do with the last two or three cucumbers to come off the vine is to brine them for two days, and then just rinse and drop into one of your jars from which you've already consumed a pickle or two.

Three Quiches

Mexican Quiche

I'll start with my variation on the theme. I learned to make quiche from a college roommate many moons ago. I've since morphed the classic quiche Lorraine recipe into my own adaptation, using the flavors of the southwest that I like so much.

The crust. If you want a quick quiche, and you're not experienced at making pies, then just go buy a pie crust. However, I think a special touch for the Mexican quiche is to make a masa harina crust. Masa harina (a corn flour used to make tortillas, tamales, etc.) isn't as workable as white flour, so you would need to either use more shortening than normal, or just deal with it falling apart on you. I prefer the latter, as I try to minimize the trans fats you get from Crisco. For regular quiches, I prefer homemade pie crusts anyway. They're just better, and in my book, worth the work.

Ingredients

• pie crust
  
• 1 cup shredded cheddar / monterrey jack cheese (I use about half and half)
  
• 4 eggs
  
• 2 cups whipping cream
  
• 1/3 cup chopped onion
  
• 1/2 cup chopped tomatillos (about 4 or 5? I always buy too many)
  
• (optional) 1/4 cup chopped chayote
  
• (not optional) 1 tablespoon comino
  
• 1 tsp chili powder
  
• 1/2 to 1 chopped jalapeno, habanero, or the like to the level of spiciness you can handle
  
• 1/2 tsp salt
  
• a few turns of freshly grated black pepper
  

If you're not familiar with chayote, that's a really cool Mexican squash. I first had that a couple of years ago when I added it to a Mexican style cornbread dressing for Christmas dinner. It's nothing like any other squash I've ever had. It's green and firm, and sweeter than zucchini. When you chop it up, it's as slimy as okra, but the slime comes out while chopping - not cooking, so you don't end up with the mucous factor you get when cooking okra. For the record, I don't like okra. So check it out if you can. I can find it just about everywhere in Houston.

The tomatillos are the key ingredient to this dish - I don't know how common they are in other parts of the country, but again, I can always find those in my neighborhood grocery store in Houston. Tomatillos add a lot of sweetness, but they also add a lot of liquid. I've found that if I don't really push the baking time to maximum browning on the top, it's a bit too wet.

So, let's get started. Heat the oven to 425, put all of the ingredients other than the eggs / cream in the quiche pan. I beat up the eggs and add the whole cream in big 1 quart measuring cup, so it's consistent. They key is you may not use all of this mixture, so you want to get the ratio right. The proper ratio is supposed to be 4 eggs to 2 cups cream, but I typically use about 3/4 of that (1.5 cups cream) due to my use of additional ingredients. Due to the additional liqui the tomatillos, I cut back the cream a bit. Also, a lot of folks say, "holy moly, whole cream?" Yes, I've done half and half - or used some cream and some lowfat milk. Again, the more liquid you go, the more you need to fill in the gaps with cheese, veggies, or eggs.

Pour the egg/cream mixture into the quiche pan until it's brimming at the top and commence baking. A dust of some of the chili powder on the top gives it a nice look.

Bake uncovered for 15 minutes, then lower the heat to 300. Bake 30 to 40 minutes until you can insert a knife in the middle and it comes out clean.

Quiche Lorraine

This is the original. Use the above ingredients, except substitute swiss cheese for jack/cheddar, drop the tomatillo, chayote, jalapenos, and comino. Use a sprinkle of red pepper flakes instead. Add 8-12 slices of cooked crispy bacon.

Quiche Florentine

Like Lorraine, but drop the bacon and add fresh spinach. I still remember the time I made this when I was a young single guy living in Arkansas. I made a batch of quiche in the little foil pans you get when you buy frozen chicken pot pies, so I could take them to work for lunch. One of my co-workers was asking me what was in there while we were eating in the lunch room, and when I got to the spinach, she said in the best Arkansas accent, "you just ruraned (ruined) it." I don't think I've made it since.

Quiche [insert your idea here]

I think you get the picture - this is a versatile dish - like an omelette - add your favorites, and stick to the cream/egg/cheese ratios, and you'll have yourself a new creation you can call your own.