Best Fried Pickles Recipe - Top Recipes (2024)

FAQs

What is the secret to a crunchy pickle? ›

Use Calcium Chloride

Sea salt is sodium chloride. In this case, we're talking about calcium chloride! These little granules, which dilute quickly in water, are THE trick to crunchy pickles, as they prevent the enzymes from softening the pickle during lacto-fermentation.

Dry the pickles well.

Pickles live in liquid and they need to be very dry before frying if you want the breading to stick well.

And if your leftover pickles appear too dry, a quick spritz of cooking oil can be beneficial. Air fry the pickles for three to four minutes, but always be attentive as the size and thickness of your pickles and varying air fryer models can alter the ideal reheating time.

To keep your pickles from getting soggy, use a sturdy breading. This one is made with a mix of flour and cornstarch. The cornstarch is key: it absorbs excess moisture from the wet pickles which results in an even crispier fried coating.

Pickle Crisp, I learned, is a trade name for calcium chloride, a common additive in commercial canning. Calcium chloride is used for several purposes, but in pickles it is mainly a firming agent.

Calcium chloride is mainly used in canning to make crunchy pickles. It can also be used in lacto-fermentation! Fermentation tends to soften vegetables, so using calcium chloride helps keep the vegetables crunchy.

While you're prepping your pickles and batter, you need to get the oil hot, really hot. About 375 degrees Fahrenheit is great. This is an important step, because if your oil isn't hot enough your pickles won't fry in a way that achieves that perfect super crispy texture.

Alum, short for aluminum sulfate, is used in pickling to promote crisp texture and is approved, though not recommended, as a food additive by the United States Food and Drug Administration.

Pickles are soft or slippery.

This can happen when the blossom ends of the cucumbers are not removed. Cut 1/16-inch off blossom ends of cucumbers. The blossom end contains an enzyme that may cause softening. This can also happen if the brine or vinegar was too weak.

You can prep the dredge ingredients 1-2 days in advance. You can dredge the pickles up to 30 minutes before frying and place them in the fridge to help the dredge set. You can fry them and keep them warm in the oven for about 15 minutes, but not longer as they will lose their crispiness.

Do leftover fried pickles need to be refrigerated? ›

Leftovers will keep for 2-3 days stored in the fridge in an airtight container.

Using too weak a salt brine or vinegar solution may cause soft or slippery pickles, as can using moldy garlic or storing the pickles at too warm a temperature.

One of the secrets to getting crunchy pickles is to add leaves, such as grape, oak, raspberry, blackberry, or cherry leaves that have tannins in them.

Cucumbers are soaked in a saltwater brine solution to generate fermented pickles, which then ferment naturally with lactic acid-producing bacteria. The sour flavor and crunchy texture of fermented pickles are a result of this process.

It replaces pickling lime, which home picklers have long used to firm cucumbers into pickles . Calcium chloride aka pickle crisp is easier to use: you add 1/8 teaspoon along with the fruit or vegetable pieces and the pickling liquid to a pint jar, or 1/4 teaspoon to a quart jar and voila! Your done!