Falling For McClures

I talk about pickles alot...ok, ALL THE TIME...and when I do, I ALWAYS go on and on about my favorite pickles in the whole world, yet I've never declared my love for them on Pickle Freak. Why? I dunno. I guess I wanted it to be special...I can be a little shy sometimes...but I can't wait any longer.


Mom, Dad, I want you to meet someone very special in my life: McClure's Pickles.

I discovered McClure's over a year ago online... I guess I had been googling spicy pickles at work (again) and I came across the website and later headed over to Williamsburg to buy some. When I got them home I realized that everything was about to change.

Up to that point my favorite pickles were expensive ones from Dean & Delucca and they were $14 a jar. DAMN.Since they were so expensive I limited myself to one or two a day and made myself eat the cheaper "everyday pickles" that I ordered from Texas in the meantime...but once I had McClure's, I knew there was no turning back, there would be no more "everyday pickles" unless they were McClure's...So I figured in order to offset my pickle expenses I was just going to have to keep quiet about them. If I start TELLING people how good they are, well, they're gonna want to TRY them and I'm not sharing mine. Nope. You've gotta get your OWN.

A little while later it was time for the Lower East Side's International Pickle Festival so I bullied a group of folks into going and introduced them all to my new (pickle) love. It would be safe because they could all buy their own! I also introduced my real love to McClure's AND to the full extent of my crazed pickle "enthusiasm"...he still pretends to struggle to understand but when I catch him drinking out of a pickle jar I get a little weak in the knees...so I'm pretty sure he's comin' around.

That day at the Pickle Fest we loaded up with as many jars of McClure's as we could, a day that made me YEARN for a shopping cart and a CAR...or a freight truck, or at least a pack mule. They come in 2 varieties: Spicy and Garlic. Both are AMAZING but spicy is my favorite. The jars are packed with the prettiest flowering dill, garlic and peppers. I recently gave a jar to a friend as a gift (I owed him big time) and he exclaimed, "These are a work of ART!". I know.



What I especially love about these pickles is that every single thing in the jar BESIDES the pickles is just as amazing as the pickles themselves. I drink the juice and use it to make the BEST pickle martinis, and I use the garlic, dill and peppers in cooking ( I have a new dish I call "Pickle Pasta"). They also make a relish now (spreadable pickles!) and I think they may have a Bloody Mary mix in the works...but in the meantime, you can just fill your half empty pickle jar with vodka and tomato juice and make the BEST Bloody Mary in the world!


ANYWAY, the whole point of introducing y'all to my pickle crush is to brag that this year at the 8th Annual International Pickle Festival I will be SELLING McClure's Pickles. I am so excited to be able to share these pickles with EVERYONE without them coming out of my own personal STASH!