Thursday, October 20, 2016

Apple Days









Laird's Applejackery :: natural apples :: hennypenny :: sweet Mary :: by the bucket 
 Buster the orchard dog :: saving for later :: guinea hen


Now that I have resurfaced from the deep dark depths of apples, I can tell you all about it. 

My sweet friend Mary is currently renting from a friend who has apple trees, bearing more apples than he can possibly use in even this bad {late frost} year. He doesn't spray them, so not only are they "organic" they are completely chemical free!

Julian and I traveled to a commercial apple orchard early in our marriage, at my insistence, regardless of the fact that Julian said I wouldn't enjoy it. I didn't. No, not one bit. It was a complete tourist trap, with apples so heavily laden that they hung there perfectly on the trees with not a divet, a dimple, with nary an imperfection to be seen. And not a bird in sight because there was not a bug in sight. Because bugs and birds and bees like apples just the same as we, and don't they have a right to? 

That ain't right, folks. Apples grown in nature LOOK like things that grew in nature. (End rant.)

You can imagine how much fun this was for me.

I grew up on homemade applesauce throughout the winter and always try to acquire apples enough to put up one quart per week of winter (13). In addition, if I can make a few apple pies or put up enough sliced apples for a few winter pies, I'm so much the better. So I picked and picked, enjoyed my time with sweet Mary, and came home with about 80lbs of apples. 

Into the freezer went apples enough for three pies, fifteen quarts of applesauce, and four quarts of grated apples for breads or cakes or fritters. I made a fresh apple pie and THEN took 30lbs to my sister in law and made at least one batch of apple sauce with her, put sliced apples in the freezer for a winter pie AND baked a fresh pie!

How about yourself? Have you had a chance to enjoy apple season before pumpkin season swamps us entirely?

4 comments:

  1. now that's a lot of apples!! I haven't been to the apple orchard and I'm toying with the pumpkin patch...I have to convince you know who!!

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  2. I grew up with our church having an apple butter day. We'd start peeling apples bright and early in the AM and continue all day long stirring a big pot over a fire.

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  3. How do you freeze apples for pie and cakes and breads later in the winter?

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    1. I grate them for cakes and breads and peel, core and slice for pies. I add about 1/4 c. sugar to each gallon ziploc bag full ( less in quart bags for grated apples) and then seal them up. I let them sit out on the counter until the sugar makes them good and syrupy, then freeze.

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