I draw the line on green beans for Dilly Beans when the pod starts to have lumps from the seeds. Otherwise, I'd probably still use them. Hard to tell without seeing them. Some varieties stay tender, others get tough and the string is awful.

You can always seed those big zucchinis and grate the flesh. Freeze in two cup packages for recipes all winter!

Deanna

I still have frozen shredded zucchini from last year! Not to mention all sorts of brown frozen bananas ;-)

The beans aren't lumpy, so seeds aren't big yet, the pods are just bigger than we like to eat steamed, but I thought they might hold up to Dilly Beans better, and they are about the size you'd see in a 3-bean salad. I was thinking the Ball Complete recipe, except I don't have limas (mine are still flat pods), I don't like celery so I was wondering if I should make it with just the green and wax beans, add cooked limas or canned drained chickpeas or kidney beans when opening, add a touch more celery seed for flavor. Or do you think I could sub 1 lb of green/wax beans?

OK, I've got just under 3 lbs of these big (some are a little bulgy) beans snapped, rinsed, drained and in the fridge. I have to pick up DD, but I picked these 24 hours ago and want to do something with them when I get home. I decided against the 3-bean salad since I don't have limas, don't like celery, and onions are probably going soft in the basement (I don't care for onions anyway).

I don't want all dilly beans, can I snap these shorter like for 3 bean salad, use the dilly bean recipe but instead of dill do a mix of mustard and celery seed, maybe a little sugar to have beans to mix into a 3-bean salad in the future? How much mustard and celery seed to use per pint in place of the 1-2 dill heads (figuring 1-2 tsp dill seed is equivalent to 1 head, I think 1 tsp of each per pint might be good, would 2 tsp or 1 Tbsp each mustard and celery seed be too much)? I think I would end up with 4 pints.

Ball uses 1 Tbsp mustard seed and only 1 tsp celery seed (but 2C celery) for 5-6 pints of bean salad.

Not sure about the garlic for a 3-bean salad - there isn't any in the Ball recipe. So I think I'll skip it. Ball uses sugar b/c their brine is almost 3/4 vinegar - lots of low-acid veggies in there (onion, pepper, celery, limas). The Dilly Bean recipe is half vinegar so I'm thinking just use ACV and skip the sugar?