I recently met a Hungarian woman, who told me about a traditional style of pickle-making in her home country, known as kovászos uborka (literally “cucumber pickles”). It’s unique in a few ways from other dill pickle recipes I’ve seen.
- It uses a slice of sourdough bread to “fertilize” the jar to give a ready source of food for the microbes, which speeds up fermentation.
- It is fermented in direct sunlight.
- It slices the cucumbers so they are exposed to the brine.
- It takes just 4 days for a fully fermented pickle!
Hungarian Style Dill Pickles
Ingredients
- 1 lb pickling cucumbers
- 3 sprigs fresh dill
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 tsp (5 ml) mustard seeds, any variety
- 1 fresh fig leaf or fresh grape leaf
- 4 tsp (20 ml) fine sea salt
- 1 slice sourdough bread (can be stale)
Instructions
- Slice 1/4 to 1/2 inch (1/2 to 1 cm) from each end of the cucumbers.
- Carefully cut a slit down the length of a cucumber, starting and ending the cut 1/2 inch (1 cm) from both ends, so as to keep the ends intact.
- Turn the cucumber 1/4 (90 degrees) and repeat the same slit, careful not to cut all the way to the ends. Repeat 2 cuts per cucumber.
- Peel garlic and add to clean quart/liter jar. Add mustard seeds, dill sprigs (stems and all), and fruit leaf.
- Dissolve salt into 2 cups (1/2 liter) filtered water to make a 4% brine.
- Add cucumbers to jar, packing tightly.
- Pour brine until it completely covers the cucumbers.
- Add the bread slice on top of the contents so it fits in the jar.
- Add a cover such as a bowl or plate to create a seal so flies cannot get into the jar.
- Leave in a warm, sunny spot for 4 days.
- Remove bread (which is now soggy) and add to compost.
- Add lid and move jar to refrigerator for storage. Keeps up to 2 months in fridge.
Author and founder of Fermenters Club. I’ve been fermenting food for 14 years.
In 2024, I published my first book, Fearless Fermenting.
When not stuffing things into jars, I enjoy permaculture gardening, cooking, yoga, writing, and studying cosmology and esoteric traditions.
Well u need to put the jar on the sun light and after 3 days it’s done I grow up making it all summer w my grandmother …it’s always delishes …..
Nop need for leaf of any kind ….
No need sourdough either ……regular bread not weat just white ….sandwich bun better .
Yes, I’ve added a large grape leaf and it seems to have eliminated the mushiness. Thanks, Austin.
I don’t understand how sourdough bread ‘inoculates’ the ferment… aren’t all the SCOBY microbes killed in the bread-baking process? Just like commercial beer is pasteurized?
Good point! It’s likely that all the living microbes in the sourdough bread were destroyed during baking. It may be more accurate to say that the bread “fertilizes” the ferment, giving a ready food source to the microbes from the veggies.
Austin, I’ve made these twice now but they came out way soft. Mushy actually. Is this anyone else’s experience? I’m about to prepare batch #3. Any suggestions?
Take a look at our classic dill pickle recipe for tips and tricks. One is to use a fig or grape leaf to help keep the cukes crispy. You can also add more salt to the brine to slow down the fermentation action.