The Best Ever Refrigerator Dill Pickles
Bright, fresh, garlicky, tangy, and full of that classic dill pickle flavor, these refrigerator dill pickles won’t disappoint! You’ll never go back to store-bought again!
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Okay, I don’t say Best Ever lightly. But I can’t stop eating these pickles.
Seriously. I made one jar of them a week ago and they were SO GOOD I went straight back to the farmer’s market and got enough for half a dozen more jars.
You know, to last me the week until the next farmer’s market.
Even though I was all about the refrigerator pickled okra last summer, I had never made dill pickles before.
But this year I planted some pickling cucumbers in my garden and I figured I should try making pickles with some farmer’s market cucumbers before I have cucumbers from my own garden.
Since I don’t usually have a huge yield in my garden, I’m very stingy with my home-grown produce and always want to do the Best Thing Ever with whatever I grow. So a dill pickle trial run was in order.
For some reason I was skeptical that they would actually taste like dill pickles. To me, fresh dill doesn’t smell or taste like dill pickles, so I didn’t think homemade ones would stack up to what I was used to.
They stacked up and far surpassed!
I brought the rest of the jar to work and passed them out to my coworkers like candy. One of them went straight to the farmer’s market and got her own cucumbers to pickle.
Why these refrigerator dill pickles live up to the name Best Ever
- They’re fresh, crunchy, tangy, garlicky, and full of that dill pickle flavor — even after only a day in the fridge.
- They are SO STINKIN’ EASY to make. You just throw a few ingredients in a pot, bring to a simmer, cool, and pour over your cucumbers in a jar. These are refrigerator pickles, so there are no canning baths and whatnot to worry about.
- You can make half a dozen jars of pickles in hardly more time than the time it takes to make one jar. And trust me, you’ll want to. The only real additional time is extra time spent peeling garlic and cutting your cukes.
- When you price it out, they are way cheaper than storebought pickles — almost half the price — especially if you’re getting cucumbers in season from a farmer’s market. More on that in a minute.
Definitely worthy of using my own precious homegrowns, if I end up with any!
More on cost
I spent about $7 at the farmer’s market on enough cucumbers for 6 jars of pickles (18). I did shop around and avoided the one vendor selling pickling cucumbers 3 for $2.25 since the other two were selling them for $1.50 a pound and 2 for a dollar.
Add maybe 50 cents worth of white vinegar (I get a biggish jug), 50 cents worth of garlic, $3 for dill… I already had mustard seeds and whole peppercorns but if you need to get some they will give you SO MANY PICKLES.
Anyway, I figure it averages out to less than $2 a jar. I pay about $3.50 for storebought pickles and these are so much better!!
I seriously don’t think I’ll ever go back to store-bought pickles again.
Supplies and tips for making refrigerator dill pickles
Lucky for me, they only sold mason jars by the dozen at the grocery store. Because the moment I took a bite of that first pickle, I knew I had to make more. LOTS more.
These wide-mouth pint-sized canning jars are the ones I used. Since these are refrigerator pickles, you can use any other clean glass jar like a spaghetti sauce jar too. You may, however, run into issues of your pickles floating, or need to adjust the amount of liquid to the size of your jar.
If you are using standard pint-sized canning jars, get cucumbers that are no more than 4 1/2″ long or they won’t fit! For the pint-sized wide-mouth mason jars, one jar fit exactly three cucumbers, or 12 pickle spears.
I cut most of my pickles into spears but I did do one jar of crinkle cut slices for sandwiches too. Here is the mandoline I used to crinkle cut my pickle chips!
A note: This recipe is for refrigerator pickles, so these are not shelf stable! You will need to keep them in the fridge until they’re gone. I read that refrigerator pickles will keep for a couple months in the fridge, if you can manage not to eat them all in a day or two!
These taste great even after only 24 hours but will become more flavorful after another day or two.
I have portioned the recipe to make one jar of pickles, but if you hover over the “1” where it says it makes 1 pint-sized jar, you can adjust the slider to tell you how much of everything you’ll need for however many jars you want to end up with!
Like these? Try these other refrigerator pickles!
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Best Ever Refrigerator Dill Pickles
Ingredients
- 3 pickling cucumbers 4-4 1/2″ long, but no longer
- 1/4 oz fresh dill a few sprigs per jar
- 1/2 cup white vinegar
- 1/2 cup water
- 2 cloves garlic crushed with the side of a knife
- 1 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 1/4 tsp sugar
- 1/2 tsp whole mustard seeds
- 1/4 tsp whole black peppercorns
Instructions
- Wash cucumbers and cut into spears or slices. Pack into a wide-mouth pint-sized canning jar, or any clean glass jar. Since these are refrigerator pickles a canning jar is not necessary. Tuck several sprigs of dill in between the cucumbers.
- In a non-reactive saucepan (see note), combine the vinegar, water, garlic cloves, salt, sugar, mustard seeds, and peppercorns. Bring to a boil and stir until the salt and sugar are dissolved. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature.
- Pour liquid over cucumbers in the jar. Make sure to include all the mustard seeds, peppercorns, and garlic. (If making multiple jars, include two cloves of garlic per jar and divide the mustard seeds and peppercorns approximately evenly between jars.) If you are using a slightly larger jar and the liquid doesn’t fully cover the pickles, fill the rest of the jar up with water.
- Close the jar and refrigerate for a minimum of 24 hours but preferably 48 hours. Enjoy!
Made these pickles last year and this year. Everyone loves them! My friends like them hot so I put about a tsp. Of red pepper flakes in the brine.
So glad you love these! You can also use serrano pepper to make them spicy: you can read more here! https://www.pinchmeimeating.com/spicy-refrigerator-dill-pickles/
This recipe looks delicious. Do you think I can use this to make freezer pickles?
Last summer I made your dill pickles, and everyone loved them! Hurricane Ida came thru our area and destroyed a lot of our possessions! Hence, I did not have your dill pickle recipe! Thankfully, my sister had the recipe and I will be making these Best Ever Refrigerator Dill Pickles! They really are the best ever and we love, love, love them! YOU are the best for creating such a wonderfully delicious recipe! Thank you!
Thanks so much for sharing! I’m so sorry you got hit by Hurricane Ida. Glad the pickles are such a hit!
Can I use this brine/ recipe for water bath canning
I am going to try hot water canning this recipe today. From my experience the recipe will work. Cover with water bath for probably 15 minutes for most average altitudes. The cooler your brine the crunchiness remains through the bath but if it’s warm or hot it will soften the pickle outcome.
I am going to try hot water canning this recipe today. From my experience the recipe will work. Cover with water bath for probably 15 minutes for most average altitudes. The cooler your brine the crunchiness remains through the bath but if it’s warm or hot it will soften the pickle outcome.
Can you use just regular old cukes?
If you want to use regular old cukes, I’d go with seedless English cucumbers and just cut them to a pickle-sized length. Avoid cucumbers with waxy skin and large seeds for pickle-making!
My wife and I have tried many recipes for refrigerator dill pickles, and these are the BEST!!!
Thanks so much for sharing! Glad you love them!
Do you have to use fresh lids/seals to make these? And if you do use fresh seals can they be reused since you’re technically not processing them?
Any old jar and lid will work as long as it’s clean, since these are just refrigerator pickles! If they were canned shelf-stable pickles I’m sure you’d have to do the whole sterilization thing and whatever else traditional canning requires, but these are easy peasy.
Hi Caroline. When I make these, the garlic cloves turn blue every time. I know it doesn’t affect the taste but also doesn’t look very appealing when sharing a jar with friends. Any thoughts? Thanks.
These are the bomb BTW! 😍
Woah, I’ve never had my garlic turn blue but apparently that is a thing! It’s a reaction between the amino acids in the garlic and the acid in the pickle brine. So weird! Totally safe to eat still.
This article from The Spruce has tips on how to avoid your garlic turning blue when pickling it! It could have to do with your water (you can use distilled, although I never do), your salt (use iodine-free), or the cookware you use (use stainless steel or enamel — not copper, aluminum, cast iron, or tin). If you use one of the non-recommended types of cookware, it can also impart a metallic taste in your pickles, which is never fun.
https://www.thespruceeats.com/garlic-turns-blue-when-pickled-1327752
Hope this helps! Glad you like the pickles!
Omg!!!! I just made them and my garlic turned blue! 😆😆 glad to know it’s not just me… must be the vinegar.
Can I use pickling spice instead of the mustard seed, etc?
I bet you could! It will probably affect the final flavor some but technically speaking the recipe should still work.
All of my garlic, black peppercorns, and mustard seeds fell to the bottom immediately even packing the larger mason jar full of spears. I tried one after 48 hours and of course the bottom half of them tasted more pickle-like (top half tasted like a normal cucumber), but I’m a little disappointed as I know if I turn the jar upside down (with my luck) it will leak all over! Maybe I should have made them smaller!
Best ever!! I made over 40 jars and just ran out. Suffering from pickle withdrawal,my garden done w them, and finding none in the stores, I hit the farmers market and found some 4 for $1! I bought 24 and doing some pickles again! Ty cor this recipe! Everyone that tries them loves them!👍🏼💚😊
Wow, that’s a lot of pickles!! So glad you love this recipe, and what a great deal you found at the market!
These are truly the best dill pickels I have ever tasted. They are crisp and crunchy and the taste is so wonderful, AND they are so easy,easy, easy. I love to make them. I am sorry to see fall come which means I have gotten my last batch of little cucumbers from my farmers market! I also love how I can adjust the recipe up or down depending on my amount of cucumbers. It is a great feature.
I’m so glad you loved these! Thanks so much for your comment!
Samantha, right? It happens every time with the blue garlic. 😄😄 Regardless, these pickles are the BEST!! ❤️
I’ve never gotten blue garlic myself but I imagine that would be shocking if you don’t know that’s a possibility! I’m so glad you like the pickles!
These are truly the best dill pickels I have ever tasted. They are crisp and crunchy and the taste is so wonderful, AND they are so easy,easy, easy. I love to make them. I am sorry to see fall come which means I have gotten my last batch of little cucumbers from my farmers market! I also love how I can adjust the recipe up or down depending on my amount of cucumbers. It is a great feature.
Thanks so much for your comment and review! They’re some of my favorite summer snacks to make too!
We recently made these and they turned out SO GOOD! I did make a few changes, I doubled the amount of garlic, used a small amount ground mustard (I didn’t have seeds), and added some red pepper flakes. I made a jar of spears, one jar of whole, and one jar of slices. Will definitely be using this recipe again.
Thanks so much for commenting! I’m glad you liked the pickles!
OMG!!! These are delicious!! Never, ever again will I make dill pickles that I have to process! The beauty of this is you can pick your cucumbers as they get big and do one jar at a time. Delicious after two days. Going to open one that has been sitting for over a week! Thank you!1
I love small batch refrigerator pickles for that reason! I did my pickled okra the same way and it was perfect because I’d just collect them from my plants until I had enough for a jar or two. Not sure if you’re growing okra too but if you are you might want to check it out!
https://www.pinchmeimeating.com/easy-refrigerator-pickled-okra-two-ways/
My favourite store bought dill pickles have no sugar. I hate sweet pickles. Can I leave it out or is it important for some reason? Thanks.
The sugar helps balance the acidity of the vinegar just a bit — never fear, these are definitely not sweet pickles! You can leave it out if you’d like but I’d give it a shot as written and see what you think.
These are INSANE! We powered through a whole jar in a day, and have 5 more waiting for us to devour over the next week or two :). I will be making batch after batch until my pickles run out in fall! Thank you so much! Passed this recipe along to several friends already!
Yay!! Thanks for the lovely review! I hope your friends like them as much as you do too!
Easy and delicious. Ready in 24 hours.
Thanks for your comment, so glad you liked these!
I really love this recipe!!! Nice, crisp and easy to pull together one quart or pine at a time as cucs come along. They make lovely gifts.
Thanks a ton!!!
I do love small batch refrigerator pickle recipes for that reason — easy to make a jar or two at a time from your garden! I’m so glad you’re enjoying these!
Made these yesterday with cucumbers and dill fresh from the garden. We had them with dinner tonight (we couldn’t wait) and they turned out great! My husband loved the crunch! He says that now we need to grow our own garlic next year. Thank you for the recipe!
Oh wow, I bet these would be even better with homegrown dill and garlic! I’m so glad you liked these! Maybe I’ll have to try my hand at growing dill and garlic too!
I found your site because I googled what to do with all the dill I have sprouting!! Dill is so easy. We also planted some garlic that is sprouting like crazy. Go for it!
These turned out great! Highly recommend this recipe!
Yay! Awesome!
Love the garlic punch! My son and daughter (both grown adults) love pickles so I decided to try your recipe, glad I did! I picked over 30 cucumbers from my garden and made 4 quarts. I will bring a quart or 2 to her and my son will eat them like chips:-):-):-) I would have done more but ran out of garlic!
Thanks for sharing!!!
I’ll eat a whole pint in one sitting too! They are addictive, aren’t they?