Lightly salted cucumbers - cold recipe (6 methods)

One of the most common ways to prepare cucumbers is to pickle crispy cucumbers for the winter, so today I will tell you recipes for cold pickling in a 3-liter jar.

The recipes are very simple, anyone can prepare them without any problems.

A few tips to consider before you start preparing

Use cucumber varieties for pickling
Select only high-quality vegetables, without mechanical damage, stains, or rot.
Use coarsely ground special purpose salt for salting; under no circumstances use iodized salt.
Pre-soak cucumbers in cold water for 1 – 2 hours
Rinse jars and lids well
Use clean water for brine, ideally spring or well water; if the water is from the tap, be sure to filter it
It is better to store such preparations in a cool, dark place, preferably in a cellar or cold pantry.

By following these tips, you will always get beautiful, crispy, aromatic cucumbers on your table in winter

The simplest and easiest recipe for pickling crispy cucumbers for the winter
Recipe for cold pickling cucumbers in a three-liter jar
Pickling cucumbers for the winter, a simple recipe from my great-grandmother video

Recipes for cold pickling cucumbers in jars for the winter

How to make the most delicious crispy cucumbers using the cold method

There are several nuances that help prepare ideal lightly salted cucumbers:

For harvesting, take pickling varieties, with tubercles and white thorns. Smooth varieties are considered salad varieties and are not suitable for quick salting.
Select fruits of the same size, then they will be salted at the same time.
Try to process the cucumbers right away; stale ones will not give the desired taste. And it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to enjoy a crispy cucumber.
Salt. Only stone, coarse grind. Iodized and finely ground salt will make the greens soft, neither crunchy nor enjoyable.
To make greens crispy, be sure to soak them in cold water. Thanks to this, they will become dense, without voids.
Do not get carried away with seasonings so that they do not “clog” the taste of a real lightly salted cucumber. Use in moderation. The best are dill and garlic. Add currant, horseradish, and cherry leaves, which give the pickling a unique aroma and protect the product from mold. Black pepper and bay leaf are perfect.
Pickle in small batches, because the longer the preparation sits, the more the cucumbers salt out and become soft.

Selection and preparation of cucumbers for pickling

The first thing you need to do is choose the right cucumbers. They should have pimples, since smooth ones are considered salad and are not suitable.

The best option would be those grown in your own garden, but if you don’t have a summer house, you can buy them at the market or supermarket. The same thing with greens - ready-made sets of greens are sold.

Important! If you use medium-sized vegetables (about 10 cm in length), then they are ready to eat the very next day.

Before starting work, you need to wash everything. Then you need to pour cold water over the cucumbers and leave them like that for 2 hours.

This procedure is necessary so that they absorb a little water, so they will be crispy and have a fresh look.

Important! Lightly salted cucumbers must be stored in the refrigerator or in the basement, otherwise they will spoil very quickly as a result of the accelerated fermentation process.

Lightly salted cucumbers - a simple classic cold recipe

The best, proven over the years, universal method for quick small salting. Convenient to make in a 3 liter jar or large saucepan. Vegetables and the amount of seasonings can be taken by eye, but the proportion of water and salt is classic and should not be violated.

We take:

Cucumbers.
Garlic.
Dill with umbrellas.
Leaves of cherry, black currant, horseradish.
Peppercorns.
Water.
Salt – for every liter of brine 70 g.

How to cook:

The day before, fill the cucumbers with water and leave to soak for a couple of hours. Then trim the ends on both sides. It is permissible to skip this procedure, but then the salting process will slow down.
Rinse the greens and peel the garlic. Divide the leaves into two halves.
Make a cushion of greens at the bottom of the pickling container. Place the prepared cucumbers on top, sprinkling them with chopped garlic.
Cover the workpiece with the second half of the greens.
Dissolve the salt in the water, stir until it is completely dispersed.
Pour the brine over the greens and discard the precipitate from the undissolved salt.
Salting time is from 24 to 36 hours (depending on the size of the cucumbers).

Crispy lightly salted cucumbers - recipe in cold water in jars

For pickling in jars, you can take any recipe, including the simplest, classic one. I suggest expanding your culinary horizons by making spicy, crispy cucumbers in cold mineral water (check out the different options on another page). Gas bubbles quickly saturate the greens, thanks to which the pickling process is accelerated, and the cucumbers themselves become amazingly crispy.

You will need:

Zelentsy – 1 kg.
Mineral water with gas - liter.
Salt – 2 large spoons.
Garlic – 3 cloves.
Dill - a couple of sprigs.

Cooking method:

Place half of the dill at the bottom of the jar.
Fill the container with pre-soaked greens with the ends cut off. Place peeled and chopped garlic between the vegetables.
Cover with remaining dill.
Dissolve salt in mineral water and pour into a jar.
Place on the refrigerator shelf. Keep it for 12-14 hours. Then try and admire.

How to pickle lightly salted cucumbers in a saucepan with a cold recipe

An old ancestral method, preserved from the times when all pickles were made in wooden tubs. A wide enamel pan is a worthy replacement; the workpieces in it are no worse, and it’s convenient to work with. Or at worst, take it from stainless steel.

Take:

Cucumbers – 4-5 kg.
Dill umbrellas - 6-8 branches.
Garlic – 2 heads.
Horseradish leaves – 8-10 pcs.
Currant leaves – 10 pcs.
Allspice – 6 peas.
Water – 3 liters.
Salt – 2 large spoons per liter of water.

How to pickle:

Soak the cucumbers in cold water for a couple of hours. Rinse, trim butts.

Line the bottom of the pan with some currant leaves, horseradish leaves, and dill umbrellas. Leave a couple of horseradish leaves and umbrellas on top of the workpiece.

Place the cucumbers in rows, interspersing them with cloves of garlic, cut lengthwise and in half, and peppercorns. Place the remaining greens between layers.

Make a brine by dissolving salt in water at the rate of 2 tablespoons per liter.

Pour the brine into the pan, cover with a plate. Press down on top with pressure (I use a jar with other blanks as a load).

Be patient for a day, then take a sample. If the cucumbers are quite large, the pickling time increases to 36 hours.

Features of storing cucumbers

Lightly salted cucumbers must be stored in the refrigerator and not overcooked so as not to turn them from lightly salted to heavily salted. As you eat them, you can add more to the pot.

Find out more about how to properly and where best to store pickles.

Thus, the same brine can be used for up to 2 weeks, after which you will need to prepare a new brine.

Lightly salted cucumbers - cold recipe

The best recipe for spicy cold pickling. The taste of cucumbers will be spicy and pungent.

Required:

Cucumbers - kilogram.
Lemon – ½ part.
Sugar – 2 small spoons.
Salt – ½ small spoon.
Mustard powder - a tablespoon.

How to prepare:

Soak vegetables in cold water for 1-2 hours. Cut off the ends and cut into circles. Do not make thin slices; the thickness of the circles should not be less than a centimeter.
Make the brine: squeeze the juice out of half a lemon, add salt and sugar. Stir well. Add mustard powder and thoroughly rub the mixture again.
Pour the brine into a jar with cucumbers, cover with a lid and shake well. The fact is that at first there will be not enough brine, in this way we will distribute it throughout the jar. Soon the chopped greens will release their juice, and everything will be fine.
Place the container on the refrigerator shelf and take courage for the day. If you want to get the final result earlier, leave the jar on the table, then the snack will be ready after 2-6 hours.

Grandma's recipe for pickling sauerkraut

This cabbage can be prepared for the winter with barrel pickles.

For a bucket of already shredded cabbage you will need 1 full glass of salt.

A layer of cabbage (about 5 cm) is compacted and sprinkled evenly with a handful of salt, then another layer of cabbage goes on top, compacted, salted, and so on until the top of the enamel bucket (if you salt in a bucket). A very important point: when salting cabbage in such a dry way without brine, it is very important not to mix the cabbage with salt, but to compact it. Cabbage and salt laid in layers are covered with oppression, and something heavy is placed on it, for example, a jar of water. After some time, it will give cabbage juice itself, in which the fermentation process will take place. No sugar is added to this recipe, otherwise the cabbage will become slippery and the brine will be stringy.

Grandma always salted such cabbage in large barrels in the cellar, measured all the proportions like this: she tamped a bucket of chopped cabbage in layers with a glass of salt, distributing it evenly and so on to the top of the barrel, and, of course, layered the cabbage with her pickles (she made layers of pickled cucumbers between layers of cabbage).

I hope you enjoy our family recipes for delicious mustard pickles and crispy sauerkraut!

Best regards, Anyuta.

It is a known historical fact that the natives of the Pacific Islands, in order to preserve cucumbers for a long time in case of crop failure, buried them in the ground, wrapping them in banana leaves. Our ancestors preferred their own, simpler way - they began to pickle cucumbers and did it in a cold way, that is, in cold water.

If you don’t know, I’ll explain a little how cold salting differs from hot salting. Difference in brine temperature. When hot, the brine is poured into jars that have just boiled, without cooling. When pickling cucumbers using the first method, the preservation is filled only with cold water. This is the simplest, and one might even say lazy, option for preparing for the winter.

Cold brine recipe for cucumbers

Instead of water, take soy sauce, oil and a lot of different herbs - this will become the brine. For cilantro, if you don’t like it too much, there is a worthy substitute - parsley. You can do it in a jar, pan, bag.

Required:

Cucumbers - kilogram.
Dill - a bunch.
Cilantro - the same amount.
Soy sauce – 200 ml.
Garlic – 6 cloves.
Red hot pepper - a pinch.
Sunflower oil - teaspoon.
Sugar - a teaspoon.
Salt - the same amount.
Sesame seeds – 2 spoons.

How to lightly salt:

Trim the ends of the soaked cucumbers and divide into 2-4 parts, depending on the size.
Add salt, stir, let stand a little until the juice appears.
Chop the garlic cloves very finely. Chop the cilantro with dill and crush it a little with your hands.
Pour soy sauce and oil into a bowl; if you want to marinate a little, add a spoonful of vinegar, but be careful. You can do without it, or replace it with lemon juice. Add sesame seeds and red pepper to the sauce.
Add soy brine to the cucumbers, add herbs and garlic. Stir the contents.
Leave for 4-6 hours. The appetizer may be salted earlier if the greens are small.

Secrets of crunch and special taste

As you can see, there is nothing complicated in the recipes. But sometimes the cucumbers are not as crispy as we would like. So, to make cucumbers crackle, you need to know some secrets, for example, preparing lightly salted crispy cucumbers at home with cold brine, and then nothing can replace it in your lunch!

Therefore, for the “crunch”, it is advisable to immerse the cucumbers in cold water for about 3-4 hours. During this period, even limp vegetables will become more resilient and resilient.

The next important reason is water. It is better to take spring water, but if this is not possible, you can use bottled water or filtered water at home.

Some housewives use silver to purify tap water. Whether it will be pure or not cannot be said for sure, but metals improve the taste.

To add a captivating smell and unusual taste, add red or black currant berries to the cucumber brine. But make the recipe in moderation, since the taste of pickling can be very different from the classic one.

cucumbers

Before preparing lightly salted cucumbers at home with cold brine, you need to choose the right vegetables. In particular, the finished result of salting will depend on this. Cucumbers for snacks meet the following criteria:

Be of the pickling variety. These cucumbers are small and have small bumps on the skin. Smooth and large fruits are not suitable for these purposes at all. Many gardeners speak very highly of the pickling variety “Nezhinsky”.
They have the same dimensions. It is important to remember that the smaller the size of the cucumbers, the faster they will be salted.
Must be fresh and firm. For the production of lightly salted cucumbers, the freshest cucumbers used only from the garden are ideal, but purchased ones can also be used. The main thing is that they do not lie for a long time and are not soft.

Meaning of pure water

The properties of water affect the taste and shelf life of lightly salted cucumbers. Introducing water with impurities or from the tap will quickly sour the snacks, and vegetables will absorb unnecessary odors, which will negatively affect the taste. Therefore, it is important to prepare fresh brine from clean, filtered spring water.

Advice. To improve the quality of water, pour it into an enamel pan, place a silver spoon or a good copper object at the bottom, close the lid and let it sit for 2-3 hours.

Salt

Although we will be making lightly salted cucumbers, salt is a very necessary ingredient. When preparing any type of pickling, be it light pickles or other snacks, it is best to choose coarse table salt.

Fine salt and iodized salt are not suitable for this purpose. When they are used, cucumbers lose their crunch and become soft.

How much salt per liter of water should you use?

The recipe for ready-made lightly salted cucumbers includes 2 tablespoons of salt per liter of water. Depending on the level of saltiness you like, you can adjust the amount up or down as you like.

If you're better off using recipes that include weights, 2 tablespoons is 30 grams. For lightly salted cucumbers in vinegar you will need 1 tablespoon or 15 g.

Dishes

An important criterion for obtaining lightly salted cucumbers is the cooking utensils. Of course, those who have an enamel pan at home don’t need to think about anything. But for those who don't have such a pan at home, preparing salty dishes can be a challenge.

In addition to an enamel pan, you can use at least glass or ceramic dishes. The main thing is that it is deep enough. A regular glass jar is ideal for this purpose. But the use of plastic or iron containers is strictly prohibited.

Important! If lightly salted cucumbers are not sealed in a jar, but are simply cooked inside, sterilization is not necessary.

It will be enough to rinse it well. But it is impossible to cook lightly salted cucumbers without sterilizing the jars.