What to do with all the harvest-pickling green tomatoes

Yesterday I finally got sick of looking at all of the green tomatoes on my counter and in my fridge. I couldn't continue to leave them on the vine to freeze, so I had to pick them. I have had many pickled green tomatoes. Some were good and some where great. I found the spicy ones to be better. This year is the first time I have tried pickling. I did several 1/2 gallon jars of cucumber pickles, some with pickling lime and some without. The hard part about pickling is that you have to wait 8+ weeks to taste the results of your efforts. I am not a patient person, but I have thus far stayed out of the cucumber pickles, and they have to be getting close to a month. Looking through all of the pickling recipes I remember the brine starting out equal parts water and vinegar and being heated. I did not remember anything else that carried true to a majority of recipes. Here is what I did for 3 jars of pickled green tomatoes. 4 c water 4 c vinegar 1/4 c salt 1/4 c pickling spice 1 T garlic 1 T dill, because nothing screams pickles like garlic and dill, right? 1 T cayenne, hot hot hot! bring to a hard boil pour over tomatoes clean jar rims and seal jar boiling time 1 bite tomatoes 10 minutes 2 bite tomatoes 20 minutes 4 bite tomatoes 30 minutes I realized if I boil them too long they will become soft, which doesn't play well with the palette. But, even though I am a complete novice at canning and especially pickling, that the boiling is necessary to seal the jars and not have the "scum scraping" that is done with much pickling. I am sorry but from the descriptions I have read I have no desire to scape scum from the tops of jars of food I will eventually consume. The though of it completely turns my stomach. So, I guess in about a month, then 2 months I should be able to update you on the pickling experiments.