Best Easy Homemade Refrigerator Dill Pickle Recipe

It is so easy to make the best refrigerator dill pickles right in your fridge. Homemade pickles are fun and easy for the whole family to get involved.  Homemade dill pickles are super simple and ready in 3 days. If you have fresh cucumbers in our garden or a peck basket from the local farmers market or pickling cucumbers for the grocery store,  you can make these homemade pickles in no time.  

If you are not sure of the canning process this recipe is a great way to have crisp pickles in mason jars right in our refrigerator. These pickles are sweet, salty, crunchy, sour, delicious, garlicky and they are perfect for a snack or on the side of a burger. This easy recipe makes the best pickles the first time you try this recipe. 

In the late summer when there is an abundance of cucumbers in the garden you can have delicious pickles just after 3 days or you can take a taste the next day. Pickles are a great summertime food for any time and are easy to eat as a portion of finger food. Serve these crunchy pickles as a side dish for dinner or just a snack.

Buonpane Family Homemade Refrigerator Pickles Recipe from Cousin Pete:

Jim’s cousin Pete (whose name is John but everybody calls him Pete) makes the best pickles. This recipe uses garden-, fresh cucumbers garlic cloves, and fresh dill. Easy to make and just as fun to eat. 

Like most years we have a bumper crop of cucumbers, and easy garlicky dilly homemade refrigerator pickles are the plans for the week’s activity.

Garlic dill pickles, with lots of fresh garlic cloves and garden-grown fresh dill lined up in the refrigerator in mason jars, will give you a feeling of accomplishment that you too can participate in home food preservation.  

Find all my top canning recipes in this post: Basic Garden Canning Recipes.

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Canning Supplies Needed:

• Wide Mouth Canning Mason jars – Quart Jars
• New Mason Jar Canning Lids and Rims 
• Wide Mouth Canning Funnel

Ingredients needed for Refrigerator Pickles:

• Pickling cucumbers
• Garlic cloves
• Fresh Dill
• ​Pickling Spice
• Water
• White Vinegar
• Salt

How to Make Refrigerator Pickles:

• First, you will need 6 to 8 sterilized wide-mouth ball canning jars/mason jars with new lids and rims. Sterilize the mason jar by running through the dishwasher. 
• Next, collect your fresh cucumbers, and make sure to buy pickling cucumbers, not English cucumbers, and not regular cucumbers.  Wash, and remove any bad spots from the cucumber and cut it into lengthwise strips. 

• Pick fresh dill, More than you think you’ll need, As you want to put a lot of fresh dill in each jar.
• Next, prepare 2 to 3 heads of garlic, remove the skins but leave the garlic cloves whole.
• In each quart jar place 1 teaspoon of pickling spice in the bottom of the jars. Put in one clove of garlic and a sprig of fresh dill.
• Gently layer the sliced pickle spears into the canning jars, packing in as many as possible.

• When your jars are full of cucumber spears, put in a teaspoon of pickling spice, 1 to 2 garlic cloves, and as much fresh dill as you can squeeze in the mason jar.
• Now it’s time to make the pickling brine. Mix 3 cups of cold water with 8 tablespoons of white vinegar and three rounded tablespoons of salt. Mix the vinegar brine well until the salt is dissolved.
• Put a pot of boiling water on the stove and boil the lids and rims for 5 minutes to sterilize. This ensures that they are properly sterilized and free of bacteria. Use metal tongs to remove the lids and rims when you are ready to put them in the jars.
• Next, you pour the brine into the wide-mouth canning jars with the cucumbers and ingredients loaded in, leaving half an inch of room at the top of the jar. Place lids and rims on the jars and tighten the rims.
• The jars of refrigerator dill pickles now go to the refrigerator and can be eaten in three days. They last about four weeks in the refrigerator.

Variations for Garlic Dill Refrigerator Pickles: 

• Pint Jars instead of quart jars but the pickles will be smaller. 
• Use whole pickles instead of sliced spires.
• Add Dill Seed with the Fresh Dill. 
• Substitute Apple Cider Vinegar for the White Viniger.
• Add some mustard seeds. 

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