Extension > Food > Food Safety > Preserving and preparing > Vegetables and herbs > 14-day sweet pickles
14-day sweet pickles
See making fermented pickles and sauerkraut for safety precautions and details on equipment needed.
Ingredients
Can be canned whole, in strips, or in slices.
- 4 lbs. of 2- to 5-inch pickling cucumbers (if packed whole, use cucumbers of uniform size)
- ¾ cup canning or pickling salt (separated into ¼ cups, one for each of the 1st, 3rd, and 5th days)
- 2 tsp. celery seed
- 2 Tbsp. mixed pickling spices
- 5½ cups sugar
- 4 cups vinegar (5%)
Yield: about 5 to 9 pints
Procedure
- Wash cucumbers. Cut 1/6-inch slice off blossom end and discard, but leave ¼ inch of stem attached.
- Place whole cucumbers in suitable 1-gallon container. Add ¼ cup salt to 2 quarts water and bring to a boil. Pour over cucumbers.
- Add suitable cover and weight. Place clean towel over container and keep the temperature at about 70° F.
- On the third and fifth days:
- Drain salt water and discard.
- Rinse cucumbers. If any scum has formed, remove it and scald cover and weight. Return cucumbers to container.
- Add ¼ cup salt to 2 quarts fresh water and boil. Pour over cucumbers.
- Replace cover and weight, and re-cover with clean towel.
- On the seventh day:
- Drain salt water and discard.
- Rinse cucumbers and re-scald containers, covers, and weight.
- Cut cucumbers into slices or strips, if desired, and return to container.
- Place celery seed and pickling spices in small cheesecloth bag.
- Combine 2 cups sugar and 4 cups vinegar in a saucepan. Add spice bag, bring to a boil, and pour pickling solution over cucumbers.
- Add cover and weight, and re-cover with clean towel.
- On each of the next six days:
- Drain syrup and spice bag and save.
- Add ½ cup sugar each day and bring to a boil in a saucepan.
- Remove cucumbers and rinse. Scald container, cover, and weight daily.
- Return cucumbers to container, add boiled syrup, spice bag, cover, weight, and re-cover with towel.
- On the fourteenth day:
- Drain syrup into saucepan.
- Fill jars leaving a ½-inch headspace.
- Add ½ cup sugar to syrup and bring to boil.
- Remove spice bag.
- Pour hot syrup over cucumbers, leaving a ½-inch headspace.
- Adjust lids and process as below, or use the low-temperature pasteurization treatment.
Recommended process for 14-day sweet pickles
- Boiling water bath
- Pints: 10 minutes
- Quarts: 15 minutes
Contact the Food Safety team: 
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