Summertime Cukes

We grow two different varieties of cucumbers in our garden – The Boston Pickling Variety and The Suyo Long Cucumber.  I let them trellis up the side of concrete reinforcing mesh that I have anchored on the cucumber row with T-posts.  Cucumbers really thrive in our climate and their production is noteworthy.  Each day I have to check them as I don’t want them getting too large. 

For the Boston Pickling variety, I like them to be on the small side.  Sometimes I’ll overlook a ripe one covered up by all the foliage and will only see it when it gets big and begins turning yellow.  I will still eat them at that stage, but I find that they have large seeds and are a little on the bitter side.  The one in the photo below is the absolute perfect size.  It reminds me of the dill pickles that I would buy at the baseball park as a kid.  Just looking at them makes my mouth pucker.  They are so good!

Boston Pickling Cucumber

At this time of year when it is so hot outside, cucumbers make a perfect cooling snack.  I like to slice them in bowl and put some olive oil and apple cider vinegar over them along with some kosher salt and coarse ground pepper.  After you put them in the ice box for a while, they are cool, crispy, crunchy and refreshing.  I can eat them until there’s nothing left in the bowl.  And that’s a good thing, because Tricia is not a fan and we have plenty more coming as you can see by all the blooms on the vines shown above and the baby cukes shown below…

In addition to eating them raw, we’ll can our own dill pickles using the fresh dill we grew and dried this year, make fermented pickles (Tricia loves this kind!), and make tzatiki!  I can’t wait for some of that.  Here is a nice collection of Boston Pickling Cucumbers right here:

Here are the Suyo Long Cucumbers that I mentioned earlier.  They originate from northern China. We like to eat them.  They grow to about 18 inches long and sort of look like long, green snakes on the trellis.  I find that the seeds are small - almost nonexistent.   

Suyo Long Cucumbers

Now for the Boston Pickling variety, I saved seeds for the last two years and replanted using saved seed.  I've never saved seeds from the Suyo Long variety, but I'll try this year since I am out of the Suyo Long seeds that I purchased from Baker Creek.  Hopefully, I can be successful.

We'll continue harvesting as many as we can and enjoy eating them before they fizzle out in the summer heat.  Summertime cukes are a cool, refreshing snack.