Cultured Mondays - Dilly Green Beans and Radishes

The summer produce is rolling in and I have a number of ferments going with about 5-6 more to put up this week!  We will be enjoying all the cultured veggies through the winter this year.

Of all the veggies my son could love cultured, he is a HUGE fan of radishes.  I'm trying to get some in bulk from my co-op, but until then, I picked up a few at the farmer's market this week to throw into my batch of dilly green beans.

Dilly Green Beans:

*1 5L pickl-it
*1 large bunch radishes
*3 large stems of dill
*4-5 pounds green beans
*2% salt brine (19grams fine pink salt to 4 cups of water)

Thoroughly wash the radishes and green beans.  Cut the radishes into halves or quarters depending on size.  Snap stem end off green beans.  Avoid using ones with blemishes.

Place the radishes on the bottom so they do not float to the top of the jar.  Pack in the green beans as tight as possible.  Fill to the shoulder of the jar.

Pack dill into the bottom the jar - I forgot to do this and it's easier to have this packed in the bottom where it will not be floating on the top above the brine.  Add enough of the 2% brine to fill 1/2 inch above the green beans.  Add glass dunkers to keep the beans under the brine.  Place on the pickl-it lid and put in a dark, cook spot for 3 days, then place in fridge.  In this hot summer weather, I am keeping my ferments in my pantry on our cool ceramic tile.

This is after about 24 hours.  See all the active bubbling!  This means the fermentation process is working.

You can see the bubbling at the top of the jar as well.  Enjoy these yummy beans over the next months. They should be stored in an air-tight Fido.  The great thing about pickl-its and Fidos are the lids are interchangeable, which means, once you are done fermenting you can pop off the pickl-it lid and place the Fido lid on the jar.  This helps to keep the integrity of the ferment.

(Featured on the Healthy Home Economist, Homestead Revival, Real Food Forager, The Nourishing Gourmet)