Easy Fermented Cucamelon Pickles

fermented cucamelon pickles in jar with brine and bay leaf

5 from 1 vote

This easy & delicious fermented cucamelon pickles recipe is a great way to preserve your harvest for a gut healthy treat!

Prep Time10

Fermenting Time7

Total Time7 10

Course: Snack

Cuisine: American

Servings:

Calories: 10kcal

Author: Holly Lee

Equipment

1 Food Scale
1 Quart Size Glass Jar
1 Air lock lid
1 Glass Weight

Ingredients

3-3.5 cups Cucamelons **See note
2-3 cups Water **See note
22-25 grams Salt **See note
2 Dill Stems & Fronds
1 tablespoon Pickling Spice
3-4 cloves Garlic

Instructions

Rinse your cucamelons and remove any blossom ends. Soak in ice water in the fridge for several hours or overnight.
After soaking your cucamelons, weigh your jar on your food scale in grams. Write down the weight just in case your scale gets reset. Tare the jar weight.
Drain your cucamelons. Peel and slice garlic into big slices. Rinse the dill and roughly chop into large pieces.
Layer your cucamelons, garlic, dill, and spices in the jar. Start with about 1/4 of your cucamelons, then some of the garlic, dill, spices, and repeat until the jar is getting near the top, but remember to save room for the fermentation weight (but do not add it yet).
Tuck a bay leaf into the jar.
Fill the jar nearly to the top with water, remembering that you will be adding the weight so don't go too full.
Place your filled jar back on the scale. The scale should be tared from the weight of the jar at the beginning of the process, but if it got reset, refer to the weight you wrote down and subtract it from the total.
Take the weight in grams of the jar's contents (cucamelons, garlic, dill, spices, bay leaf, and water) and multiply it by .025. Write this number down. It will likely be somewhere in the mid 20s for grams.
Remove the jar from the scale and put a small dish on it for the salt. Weigh out the number you just calculated in the previous step in non-iodized salt.
Add the salt to the jar. Cap the jar with a leak proof lid and shake & swirl to dissolve the salt completely. This may take a few minutes.
When the salt is dissolved, open the lid and place your fermentation weight on top. Try to keep all floaters under the weight if you can. If you have a couple that won't go down, use a spoon to remove them.
Place your airlock fermentation lid on your jar. Leave jar in a cool place on the counter. Your pickles will be ready in 7 days. Enjoy!

Notes

The quantities of the ingredients with the asterisks* are estimations. This recipe requires a food scale. I cannot vouch for the recipe if the ingredients are not weighed. If you would like to try the recipe without a scale, my measurements give approximately 160 grams of cucamelon per cup. 1 cup of water is about 240 grams. 1 clove of garlic is about 3 grams, and one dill frond is 4 grams. When I measure 1 tbsp of my pickling spices, I get 6-7 grams. You can use these measurements to approximate your own weight based on volume.

Nutrition