Salt pickles, or salt stock, are made by curing cucumbers in a brine
which should contain not less than 9.5 per cent of salt (approximately
36° on the salinometer scale) at the start. Not only must the brine
be kept at this strength, but salt should be added until it has a
concentration of about 15 per cent (60° on the salinometer scale). If
well covered with a brine of this strength, the surface of which is kept
clean, pickles will keep indefinitely.
Proper curing of cucumbers requires from six weeks to two months, or
possibly longer, according to the temperature at which the process is
carried out and the size and variety of the cucumbers. Attempts to use
short cuts or to make pickles overnight, as is sometimes advised, are
based on a mistaken idea of what really constitutes a pickle.
Curing of cucumbers is marked by an increased firmness, a greater degree
of translucency, and a change in color from pale green to dark or olive
green. These changes are uniform throughout the perfectly cured specimen.
So long as any portion of a pickle is whitish or opaque it is not
perfectly cured.
After proper processing in water, salt pickles may be eaten as such or
they may be converted into sour pickles (p. 7), sweet pickles (p. 8), or
mixed pickles (p. 10).