Cucumber spears are rapidly and reliably packed into and around the inner periphery of a jar with the same cut side of each of the spears facing outwardly. The spears are formed by pushing a cucumber lengthwise through a set of knife blades, and the resultant spears are individually pushed through twisted channels by flexible rods which deliver them onto a horizontal platform with their cut sides down and all facing the same way. Two conveyor belts are recessed in the top of the platform, so that by lowering the platform the set of spears is deposited on the conveyor belts and conveyed downstream to a pair of adjacent platens each having grooves aligned with the conveyor belts. A fence across the conveyor arrests a first set of spears above the first platen, which is then raised to lift the first set of spears from the conveyor, whereupon a second set of spears accumulate above the second platen. The second platen is then raised to form with said first set a single array of contiguous spears which is subsequently pushed onto a roll-up belt, rolled into a cylindrical array, and pushed into the jar.