Meaning

• A cucumber preserved in a solution, usually a brine or a vinegar syrup.

  "A pickle goes well with a hamburger."

• (often in the plural) Any vegetable preserved in vinegar and consumed as relish.

• The brine used for preserving food.

  "This tub is filled with the pickle that we will put the small cucumbers into."

• A difficult situation; peril.

  "The climber found himself in a pickle when one of the rocks broke off."

• A mildly mischievous loved one.

• A rundown.

  "Jones was caught in a pickle between second and third."

• A children’s game with three participants that emulates a baseball rundown

  "The boys played pickle in the front yard for an hour."

• A penis.

• A pipe for smoking methamphetamine.

  "Load some shards in that pickle."

• A bath of dilute sulphuric or nitric acid, etc., to remove burnt sand, scale, rust, etc., from the surface of castings, or other articles of metal, or to brighten them or improve their colour.

• In an optical landing system, the hand-held controller connected to the lens, or apparatus on which the lights are mounted.

Meaning

• To preserve food (or sometimes other things) in a salt, sugar or vinegar solution.

  "These cucumbers pickle very well."

• To remove high-temperature scale and oxidation from metal with heated (often sulphuric) industrial acid.

  "The crew will pickle the fittings in the morning."

• (in the Python programming language) To serialize.

• To pour brine over a person after flogging them, as a method of punishment.