Fermented Green Tomato Pickles

Ingredients

Canning project today!  I'm pickling green tomatoes the old fashion pickling way; Fermentation.  It's a salt brine method of pickling!  No pressure cooking or hot water baths.
  Fermented foods and drinks are quite literally alive with flavor and nutrition.  Their flavors tend to be strong and pronounced. Think of stinky aged cheeses, tangy sauerkraut, rich earth and smooth sublimes wine..  Human have always appreciated the distinctive flavor resulting from the the transformative power of the microscopic bacteria and fungi.  One major benefit for fermentation is that it preserves food.  The fermentation organisms produce alcohol, lactic acid and acetic acid, all "bio preservation" that retain nutrients and prevents spoilage. -Wild Fermentation

Here is my ingredients;

1 cup Salt (sea salt or canning) *

Fermented Green tomato pickles

1 gallon of water.
Garlic
Onion
Dill
Peppercorns *
Green tomatoes
Cucamelons
Spinach
Purslane


Thoroughly mix the salt and water together dissolving the salt completely.  Do no use city water, it has chlorine, which will kill the good bacteria.

I'm using quart jars instead a crock and stone. Wash jars and vegetables.

Chop up the onion and garlic into bit size pieces.
Cut the stem end off the tomatoes to remove the stem and to provide access for the brine.

Place Dill, Garlic, Onion and Peppercorns in the bottom of the jar.  Pack the remain items in as tight as you can.  Leave enough space for brine and a headspace.   If items are floating, pack in spinach to create a cap over the floating vegetables. This will be a good enough to be a barrier to keep the item submerged.

Pour in the brine leaving a bit of a headspace and then screw on the lid.  Don't screw on the lid so tight that developing pressure can't escape.  Let the jars stand for a few days to a week in a warm room.  Taste tests after a few days will give you an idea on their progress.  Once to your liking what you are tasting, into the refrigerator or cold roots cellar to stop the fermenting action and storage.  They should last a year, if not eaten first, for about a year.

* Not grown at Prairie Home Farm