Love making pickles! with fresh cukes. Make alot of sweet pickle relish too. The kitchen smells so good when cooking up the brine, it’s one of the real pleasures of summer.
I do everything cold in the fridge, except warming up the brine enough to dissolve the salt. When a quart of pickles is empty I just reuse the brine, dropping in fresh from the garden. Usually reuse twice before making fresh. In past years I used half gallon jars. We grow our own dill and garlic too. Between pickles, sauerkraut and kefir I am happy. We made kombucha for a few years when we did not have a supply of good milk. Fermentation!