IT TOOK THE LONGEST TIME, watching generations of flowers that seemed to come and then go nowhere, but last week it finally happened: I got my first cucumber. Too bad the beautiful-looking thing turned out to be so bitter. I’m hoping to pack some big jars of my famous refrigerator pickles before long (yes, I’ll share the recipe), so I’d better get this straightened out fast. What’s up with my recalcitrant cukes? Ever had no fruit, misshapen fruit, bitter fruit in your garden—or worst of all, Cucumis sativus vines that suddenly wilted? The reasons why, and lots of culinary cucumber ideas, too.
Skip right to the bottom of the page if you just want recipes, or start with these cucumber FAQ’s:
Q. I have many flowers but no fruit forming on my cucumbers (or squash). Why?
Q. Some cucumbers finally started to form, but they are misshapen and stunted looking. What should I do?
Q. I finally got fruit! Except it’s bitter. What did I do wrong with my cucumbers?
Q. My cucumber vines were looking great—and then the vines started to wilt, though the soil wasn’t dry. Why?
Q. Are those gherkins in the top photo? Is a gherkin just any small cucumber?
Q. I have many flowers but no fruit forming on my cucumbers (or squash). Why?
A. Cucumbers and squash are by nature dioecious—that is, they have both male and female flowers on the same plant. Typically, there will be more male blooms than females, with the males developing earlier. Until there are also female flowers present, and until conditions favor proper pollination once the boys and girls are both around, you don’t get fruit (which would form right behind the female flower, below, with the male flowers dropping off after providing pollen).
So when we start thinking we’re not getting any fruit despite all the flowers it’s usually either that all the blooms are still male, or that weather conditions are preventing pollination. Unfavorable factors that prevent bees from doing their job include wet or cold weather, or anything (like chemical use) that would eliminate bees, of course.
An exception: Some hybrids have been bred to be gynoecious, or bearing all-female flowers. These require a nearby plant with male flowers to provide pollen, so seed packets of gynoecious cukes typically have some traditional monoecious seeds in them, too (they are usually dyed to tell them apart).
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Q. Some cucumbers finally started to form, but they are misshapen and stunted looking. What should I do?
A. If you see disfigured fruit beginning to form, remove it from the plant. This is a sign that incomplete pollination occurred because of some stressor: any extreme of weather, for example, and also low soil fertility can contribute. Feed the plants, and water well. I use an organic liquid feed of seaweed and fish emulsion.
Note: The above assumes the plant looks healthy. If the plant itself, not just the fruit, is also stunted or disfigured (blotches on the fruit, foliage yellowed in a mosaic pattern, for example) disfigured fruit could be a result of cucumber mosaic virus, which is often spread by aphids and affects many other crops beyond cucumbers. Again, this would be a distinctive-looking phenomenon, not just a stray misshapen young fruit on a healthy plant.
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Q. I finally got fruit! Except it’s bitter. What did I do wrong with my cucumbers?
A. There are varying opinions on what causes bitterness in otherwise-healthy cucumbers. It could be caused by cool temperatures, Washington State University says in an extensive discussion of bitterness. Purdue’s extension says soil moisture is a factor, and to water well, and mulch to get the plant back on track. That certainly can’t hurt; cucumbers are mostly water, so they need regular moisture to do well on all fronts.
All the experts agree that growing varieties known to have a low rate of bitterness is a good idea to minimize this problem. Read catalog descriptions carefully to select one next year.
By the way, subsequent fruit on the same plant in my case tasted great, another of the many unexplained miracles and magic of gardening.
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Q. My cucumber vines were looking great—and then the vines started to wilt, though the soil wasn’t dry. Why?
A. Bacterial wilt, which causes leaves and then entire vines to go limp, is spread by cucumber beetles (who also chew holes in leaves).
The key is prevention—there is no remedy for infected vines. Use floating row covers to keep beetles off young plants (opening them at pollination time), and handpick beetles aggressively if they emerge. Rotate where cucurbits are grown.
Sowing more cucumber seeds every couple of weeks until three months before first frost for multiple generations of plants may help, as some are bound not to coincide with beetles.
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Q. Are those gherkins in the top photo? Is a gherkin just any small cucumber?
A. I always thought “gherkin” was a pickling cucumber, or any other small variety like the ones up top, but in fact it’s a particular species of plant that’s a cucumber relative but not Cucumis sativus, our common cucumber. The West Indian gherkin or burr gherkin (so-called because its surface is covered in burrs) is Cucumis anguria. Seed Saver’s Exchange has a description and photo of this little, rounder beauty. Puts me in the mood for pickles…
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My Pickle Recipe, and More Cuke Dishes
MY BEST CUCUMBER RECIPE is a vintage hand-me-down I call Dan Koshansky’s Refrigerator Pickles in honor of the Long Island Railroad conductor who shared his family secret with me more than 20 years ago—it’s here (and it’s the most popular thing I ever posted on this website, my “greatest hit”—or Dan’s, really). Dan was not just a great pickle-maker, but also an organic gardener for many years, long before most people (particularly suburban gardeners like himself, who were more likely to dust and spray everything) had ever heard of the concept.
Or what about one of these other cucumber ideas? Today is cucumber week of Summer Fest, a big online recipe swap with some foodie friends. If you have one to add, or a cucumber-growing secret, put it here in the comments and be sure to share it on the other participating blogs, too. Here are the links to what they’ve cooked up (some recipes will not be “live” until after noon EDT Wednesday):
- Pinch My Salt: Chilled Cucumber, Kefir and Avocado Soup
- What’s Gaby Cooking: Cucumber-Basil Gimlet
- In Jennie’s Kitchen: Radish-Cucumber Crostini
- Big Girl Small Kitchen: Spicy Cucumber Salad with Shallot, Ginger and Mint
- Grecian Kitchen: Summer Cucumber Salad
- And Love It Too: Cucumber, Mint and Watermelon Salad
- Napa Farmhouse 1885: Cucumbers Coolers with Agave Simple Syrup
- Cooking With My Kid: Cucumber Limeade
- FN Dish: Summer Fest: Cucumber Recipes
- CIA Dropout: Relishing Cucumbers
- Healthy Eats: Cool Cucumber Soup
- Food for 7 Stages of Life: Cucumber Cherry Salsa
- Cooking With Elise: Green Tea Cucumber Pops
- Glory Foods: Cucumber and Shrimp Boat
- Virtually Vegan Mama: Fire-Roasted Tomato and Cucumber Gazpacho
- Food2: When Life Gives You Cucumbers, Make a Cucumber Cocktail
- Cooking Channel: Cucumbers Stuffed with Crab-Mango Salad
- Recipe Girl: Bread and Butter Pickles
- Taste With the Eyes: Spicy Pickled Cucumbers with Wakame and Garlic Blossoms
- Virtually Homemade: Cold Thai Cucumber-Mint Soup
- Add a Pinch: Cucumber Tea Sandwiches
- The Cultural Dish: Ahi Tuna with Cucumber Sauce and Salad
- Daily*Dishin: Cool n’ Zesty Cukes: 7 Minute Summer in a Jar
- Daydreamer Desserts: Cubanita Margarita
- Zaika Zabardast: Cucumber Gazpacho
- Cooking with Books: Summer Fest: Cucumbers
- Purple Cook: Cucumber Gazpacho with Indian Flavored Shrimp Relish
- Indian Simmer: Cucumber at its Best with Chaat Masala
- Big Apple Nosh: Quick and Easy Homemade Pickles
- Sweet Life Bake: Agua de Pepino
- The Sensitive Epicure: Tzatziki with Grilled Gluten-Free Pitas and Fresh Cucumbers and Peppers
I know those refrigerator pickles! Great to see this up and running again this year. Love Summer Fest.
And back for more! I’d like to submit this one: Chicken with Pickle Sauce. It’s not my recipe, but Food Network Magazine’s. We loved it, the toddler didn’t. Just another day here…
http://foodlets.wordpress.com/2011/07/20/chicken-with-pickle-sauce/
Good luck on your cukes. They are one of my favorite veggies…just had one for lunch. We had a hail storm in Denver a week ago that obliterated all of my vines and broad leafed plants knocking off every yellow flower and budding vegetable not to mention the fruit from the trees. I will celebrate even a bitter cucumber.
I think that they turn bitter if you wait too long to pick them. Could that be possible? If they start turning yellow it’s too late.
Good luck!
I love pickles! I posted a watermelon-cucumber-mint agua fresca for Summer Fest today. So refreshing on a hot day like today!
http://savorymomentsblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/watermelon-cucumber-mint-agua-fresca.html
When I was growing up, my dad raised 40+ acres of cucumbers every year. Excessive heat over 90 degrees means little or no pollination regardless ofyour bee population. It just doesn’t take. You also start geting a higher percentage of bitter ones and malformed or nubbins. Low nitrogen seems to contribute to nubbins, too. When night time temps drop down below 60 degrees, provided there is adequate moisture and nitrogen, the cukes will straighten out again and start setting more blossoms.
Just what I saw and heard among the cuke growers when I was growing up.
my wife and I have used the recipe of Dan’s that you were kind enough to post several years ago for a couple years now, and they are great. Crisp, garlic flavored and almost phlorescent in color, they are loved by all who taste them.
Truly a pickle for hard core pickle lovers…
Thanks Margaret for sharing this great recipe!!!
I can’t believe there’s not a sun pickle recipe on the list (unless I missed it…). Here’s my great grandma’s sun pickle recipe. http://crunchythriftycool.blogspot.com/2011/07/joining-in-cucumber-y-fun-sun-pickles.html
I always thought it was hot weather than makes cucumbers bitter. Or maybe it’s really the drought stress that comes with hot weather? But in any case, the first cucumbers I picked this year were fine, although a couple I picked last night are slightly bitter.
I wrote up my favorite cucumber/dill salad earlier this week:
http://tangledbranches.com/blog/2011/07/aunt-emmas-cucumbers/
Ha! I just grabbed an 18″ Japanese cuke I put in the fridge to chill this morning, and a knife, and sat down for a watering break (it was 102 in the shade here today.) My 2 cents, as you recommend Margaret, definitely check the seed catalog descriptions for cukes that don’t tend towards bitterness. These Japanese ones are fantastic – haven’t had a bitter one yet, seeds are small, and (unless you’re me – I can eat a whole one at a time,) you could feed a family of 4-6 on one of these enormously long cucumbers.
Your refrigerator pickles are AWESOME. My guys (husband and son) can’t get enough of them–neither can I! Instead of hot pepper flakes, I sliced a hot pepper in quarters and tossed half in each jar. YUM! Thanks for a terrific recipe.
Thank you, Nora — and always nice to see you! Beautiful with the peppers in the jars I bet — especially if they are red!
the first few cucumbers off my vines this year were very bitter but after that they have been wonderful. off to check out all your pickle recipes!! tks
My cukes taste great however after i pick them they seem to lose their crispness. I am a new gardener. Should I refridgerate them or leave them out?
So nice to see a recipe for tzaziki here — a wonderful, and refreshing dip and good use for the summer dill, which is also coming on gangbusters in my neck of the woods.
Thanks for all the ideas and recipes — you gave me the courage to cold pack and freeze a whole lug of peaches last week and it worked like a charm!
Here I am in “HOT” Marietta Georgia, just like the rest of the country. This year I decided to challenge myself in purchasing vegetable seeds from a local Supercenter at .20 cents a packet. I have great soil and just knew the seeds would do well. It’s mid summer and so far I have pulled at least 125-140 cucumbers from one packet of seeds. None bitter. Family and friends thanked me for sharing. The plants are still going strong. I have to say this year is the first time I produced just a few nubbins. The taste is still as good as the regular size. My husband calls them personal sized cucumbers. The plants are a little crowded and some cucumbers can become hidden by the leaves. When I finally spot some they are hugh.
Life is Gardening Great!
happy to report no problems this year. 14 pints of bread and butter pickles and cukes keep coming! thanks for the dish suggestions.
Hi, Theresa. I love hearing that despite the brutal temps that you are having such a good harvest. Congratulations! I know what you mean about them hiding (like pole beans). :)
Thank you for sharing the cucumber recipes – especially the refrigerator pickles! Our CSA provided us with some picklers this week, and we’ll have to try that recipe- YUM!
I have to agree with Laura; these pickle recipe looks simply delicious. In all the blogs I been perusing I had yet to find any tasty looking pickle recipe ideas, let alone methods of which to grow the cucumbers.
The cucumbers are coming in quite nicely in my garden almost ready to be harvested. I obviously have yet to make any pickles this season but when I do rest assured that I’ll be using your recipe to craft the perfect pickle.
Thanks again for the wonderful article, Margaret. I’ll be sharing this one with my friends and family for sure!
Thanks, Kyle, for the kind words. They are good pickles, I promise — and some of the recipe links here from various food bloggers look pretty good, too. Today it’s too hot to boil water for brine, but soon…
I dream about making pickles, even grow the dill which is growing great. Every year some thing goes wrong with my cucumbers. Last year my flowers were never pollinated and then my vines wilted. This year I have cucumbers but they are misshapen, taste OK, but not enough to make pickles. Some of the cucumber vines that wilted I have pulled out. It’s nice to know about the pollination of the flowers and I thought the wilted vines might be cucumber beetles. I might have to cover them next year to see if I have better luck.
I would like to add a cucumber plant problem. Go to bed at night and then wake up to find several plants with many of their leaves gone……yep, stems only left! I am certain that it is an animal (ground hog??), but not sure what kind. I live in the city, so ruled out deer. Ideas about how to handle this problem?
What a great post with lots of knowledge on cucumber plants. I plant cucumber every year and I bottle them as dill pickles. Once I open then I can eat the whole bottle.
I am a new gardener. I love this site. I am not sure the best way to store my cukes until I can make pickles. Please help. They seem to go limp after a few days
Very old-school/ 50s housewife (my ex’s grandmother used to make these):
Slice a cucumber lengthwise. Scrape out all the seeds, then fill with cottage cheese and sprinkle with paprika. Then slice them into finger-food sized bites. Healthy, simple, wicked refreshing appetizer on a hot day. (Can you tell I don’t do much cooking? Now off to find that jello mold…)
My cucumbers are not growing well this year. I have a lot of them growing in and turning yellow very early during their growth. What does this mean?
Hi, Dave. I can’t see the plants from here (bet you knew that!) but misshapen fruit as mentioned in the story can result from poor pollination…or from something as serious as cucumber mosiac virus (though you would see issues on the foliage and other plant parts, not just the fruit I think).
Hi, Sandy. Depends what the bites look like, because different pests have different tooth arrangements and bite/chew differently. Rabbits make perfect cuts at a 45-degree angle, for instance. So tidy! Deer actually pull upward on plants and strip off the leaves that way, as they have no front upper teeth so they cannot make the perfect cut that rabbits can. Woodchucks (as we call groundhogs here) love to eat the way you are describing, and they seem to take more than rabbits (less than deer) and are not as tidy in their aftermath.
Do you have woodchuck there? Or are the nipped stems perfectly cut at a 45-degree angle?
Glad to hear your cukes are thriving, Entangled. Thanks for the recipe, too.
Greetings Margaret,
Thanks for your comments! Yes, it is a groundhog/woodchuck. My garden is fence is enclosed with iron fencing, which obviously is not keeping the groundhog out. Any suggestions about further steps? Is there anything I can spray on the remaining leaves that would make them “not so tasty” for the groundhog?
Best regards, Sandy
Our cucumbers were great this year – at first! Now, due to the extreme heat we’ve been experiencing, we have to taste them before we can do anything with them. I have gotten to can a great deal of them though – and just last night made an amazing cucumber salad!
BTW, I’m in Northeast Louisiana and we’ve had 21 straight days of 100+ degree heat. It’s amazing that anything besides okra is still growing at all!
I can’t wait to try out the refrigerator pickles! Is the recipe safe for traditional canning as well?
Hi, Laura. I think if you are hot-packing you should use a recipe geared to that — not just for safety, but for flavor, too.
Hi, Jen. I know what you mean: Some are perfectly delicious, some bitter. Wacky! Impossible to know which without tasting.
Hi Margaret! As usual, enjoying your informative and witty blog, of course you know I have no garden but do love cucumbers and I come here to water and refresh the garden of my soul. On the other hand my cousin’s avocado tree is giving us the best harvest ever. Just finished reading Gift of an Ordinary Day, I so enjoyed! Thank you for continuing to enrich my life. Stay cool! My best, Daisy Marshall
Just wanted to let you know I enjoyed this post so much that I linked to it in the blog carnival (Berry Go Round) I’m hosting this month over at Beyond the Brambles!
Thanks, Kate; how nice of you. I will head over to see it now.
I have an abundance of Japanese cucumbers, some are over 12 inches long and 4 inches across. There some smaller and am wondering if I can pickle them the same as regular cukes. I need to do something with them as I can only give so many of them away. This is an unfamilar cuke to me, my husband planted them because they were burpless and I’m amazed at the size of them. Thanks for any info.
Hi, Meg. Yes, you can pickle them — I think you will have to do them in slices or chunks of course (or have VERY large jars, tee hee). I even saw some recipes online searching for pickles Japanese cucumber. This one made me laugh (the whole cuke on a stick thing).
Hello Margaret, great post. I live in San Antonio and grow cucumbers in the garden 2x per year one early spring crop and one late summer crop. I also grow in the greenhouse in winter but have the worst luck with pickles. I always get a white slimy type of growth inside the jars. I have no clue what I am doing wrong but would love any suggestions. I am an avid gardener and run a lawn and landscaping business http://jasonslawn.net so I should be a little better at this if you ask me. None the less great site, and keep up the good work. I may have to pick up a copy of your book.
Hi, Jason. Lucky you, two growing seasons (though I know it must be a challenge with the current weather trends in the SW). I don’t know if you are doing fermented pickles and then refrigerating them or hot-packing to store or ???? While things are fermenting (such as on the counter before they are refrigerated, or before they are hot packed) a small amount of scum may form (as it would with fermenting sauerkraut, etc.) but you skim it off if so to stay ahead of it, and be alert that if the pickles do get slimy or soft or have a bad odor they are not suitable for eating. I expect that more scum will form in too-warm temps — I have read that over 80 degrees is too warm, for instance, and that 70ish is ideal.
Again, not sure if you are hot-packing or fermenting out on the counter or ???? This UGa factsheet may explain some details.
Here’s my favorite cucumber recipe. If only my shiso would grow more quickly.
http://www.food52.com/recipes/4891_quick_cucumber_and_shiso_pickles
What is the shape of your cucumber trellis?
I’ve made sun pickles from the recipe posted on here…my question is …Do you keep them refrigerated or can you store them on the shelf
Hi, Linda. They are definitely refrigerator pickles — after they sour to the approximate desired degree, they must be put in the fridge. They will last a month or two or so, not indefinitey like hot-packed pickle recipes.
Try this Czech-Polish recipe:
Ingredients: small cucumbers
some slices of carrot
small onions
fresh dill
mustard seeds
bay leaves
black pepper
all spice
cloves
For a 1-litter jar: 30 dkg water
1.5 dkg salt
3 dkg sugar
8 dkg 8% vinegar
Method:
Clean jars in hot water. Put some slices of carrots, some fresh dill, some onions (cut in pieces if you have bigger ones), mustard seeds, and a bay leaf to the bottom of each jar. Then put cleaned cucumbers into to fulfill the jar tightly. Add 1clove, 2 pcs all spice, and 3 pcs black pepper into each jar. Combine water, vinegar, salt, and sugar in the quantity according to the number of jars and bring it to boil. Then pour the hot liquid over cucumbers to the very top of jars. Close with lids tightly. Sterilize in water till all the cucumbers change their color (they look like sterilized). Not longer as they could be overcooked then and not crispy. Remove carefully (it’s hot! ) and let it cool upside down on a kitchen towel. It’s because when you turn it the remaining air inside goes up through the liquid and sterilizes as well. When cold, cucumbers are ready to be eaten, but you can store them as long as you want. Opened jars are recommended to be kept in the fridge. (When any lid is loosened during sterilizing, you can close it better and put it back to sterilize for several mins more.Or you can put it into the fridge and use it as the first.)
Sorry for my English, not a native speaker. :)
Sounds wonderful, Astheart. Wouldn’t have though of the carrot!
If you think your cucumber my be bitter, cut of 1/2 inches on the stem end, rub the two cuts together, the white foam that comes out, is the bitterness. Never have another bitter cucumber.
Thanks, Suze, for this little trick!