I love pickles. In Jr. High, I developed a brand of pickles for a class project. I called them Tastums Pickles (pronounced TAYST-uhms). Lemme esplain.
The class was called G.A.T.E, which stood for Gifted and Talented Education. It was an invitation-only elective attended by a handful of nerdsters and a few smart kids who also managed to be cool. Guess which group I fit into. Hint: I liked renaissance fairs and wearing my mother’s clothes. Hint #2: OBV not the “smart but cool” group. Oddly enough, I didn’t quite fit into the “brainiac” group either. For another project, we each got to pick a country to research. I chose Saudi Arabia, because I wanted to learn about the Taj Mahal. FAIL. But back to the pickle project! While others aspired to invent Fortune 500 companies and internationally recognized conglomerates, I chose to create… a brand of pickles. How I managed to stay in that class for 2 years I’ll never know. For the product design portion of the project, I crafted a stand-up cardboard cut-out of a pickle jar. For the marketing campaign, I created a commercial jingle and a 3-D model of a singing, dancing cartoon pickle, who insisted that everyone eat him because he was so “tasty”. And so, my unusual, albeit entertaining, love affair with pickles began.
Clockwise from top left: Pickle Stickers from The Lunch Box Project; A Pickle A Day Print from Slow Industries; Pickle Post Earrings from Free Forged; In a Pickle Soap (I can attest to the quality and sheer delightfulness of these. That’s right. I OWN one!) from Molly Coddle Soap
P.S. If you have a pickle story or product, please share!
Awesome! Two things: for my Gifted and Talented invention project, I ‘invented’ a purse on wheels…a purse on a roller skate platform, to be exact. Verdict: pickles are way cooler. Also, I wrote a song that year called “Pickles Gap,” based on the place in Arkansas, of course. As opposed to the purse-on-wheels, the song is, well, amazing.
Amy. You are my soulmate. Please make me 1) a purse on wheels and 2) a recording of you singing your “Pickles Gap” song.
My mother made the best “repickled” pickles. She started with kosher dills and repacked them in a garlic-sugar solution. It sounds awful, but they were downright addictive. That recipe must still be circulating in my kitchen somewhere…
Oh, please share if you find the recipe!
ha! too cute!
Go pickles! I always thought I hated them, but our friend recently brought over a jar of his home-pickled pickles and they were delish! Maybe it was the garlic, dill and chili flakes he added.
aaaaaahahahaha I’ve only recently entered the world of loving pickles. I’ve got so much time to make up!
I love pickles.
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1. pickles are, indeed, tasty. mr tastums was right.
2. i remember watching an episode of the andy griffith show as a kid that was all about a pickle contest at the county fair & then promptly going downstairs and eating pickles at the kitchen table while pretending that i was one of the pickle contest judges from the show. who’s the nerd now?
3. may i also have a purse on wheels? i’m quite certain i need one.
Oh SHOOT, I am enjoying these pickle-y comments. Thank you, ladies, for joining in!
@jen: I’m so glad to hear you’re a pickle convert. If your friend would like to bring ME a jar of his homemade garlic-dill-chili-flake pickles, I would not turn him away… Or maybe he would be willing to share his recipe? I have not had luck with pickling
@Louise: Eat more pickles. Go!
@Lisa: You, me and Amy can all be nerds. Together. I will put in a request for a roller purse for you.
i really love the idea of pickles.
i think they are for hardcore food lovers.
my grandfather grew gherkins just to make pickles and bottled them and then forget about them and then the pantry shelves started to bow in the middles…..
one of his many talents.
Ha! Erin, your grandfather sounds like an honorable man. Anyone who grows cucumbers for the sole purpose of turning them into pickles is OK in my book.