Harvest Time!

Today was harvest day for both my Bartlet pear and Satsuma plum trees!

I'm really happy with the plum tree, as thereby hangs a bit of a tale...

When I was a kid, I LOVED the dark, sweet plums you could find every so often at the grocery store. But more and more over the years, the only plums you could find were the tart ones. Okay, but not the amazing sweet ones I grew up with.

So when we moved here in 2012, I determined to find the right kind of plum tree so I could have those danged plums again. LOTS of online research later, I settled on a dwarf (I'm short and gotta be able to reach the dang things) self-pollinating Satsuma plum...it sounded like the right one...

When we installed our backyard landscaping/plants in 2015, I was able to find ONE of those at our local greenhouse center. Here it is, in the center:

Then...I waited.

For eight years.

Over the last couple of years, the plum tree has flowered...but no fruit.

Then suddenly this May--yay, fruit! And a LOT of it! Nobody was more surprised than me, I'd long since written the tree off.

 Cue more waiting, because long about July the plums just kinda reached a ripening point...and plateaued. They never got bigger than this.

They got redder, but just--stopped doing anything, it seemed. They were fairly hard and TART, not the deep purple, sweet plums I was hoping for. At the chicken swap in July, another lady was selling little baskets of the same Satsuma plums as I had...and they were just as tart as mine.

Sigh...

Damn. Well, at least the chickens enjoyed them--in fact, we couldn't keep them out of the tree.

As evidenced by Exhibit A, Garibaldi and her plum-covered beak.

 Cleaned her up a bit for more pictures. She sure is cute, although has gotten to be so obnoxious lately we've taken to calling her 'Garibitey'.

Obligatory Communist propaganda poster pose:

So anyway, here it's September and I've given up on the tree. I finally decided to make some plum jam out of the fruit. Went out to pick some to get started sorting so I can make jam, this is about 1/3 of the amount of fruit on the tree...

 Tasted a couple, just to make sure...

...and WHAM! Dark, SWEET plums! 

 Exactly as I remembered!

They didn't get any bigger, but the taste...is amazing! The kind of thing where they never make it into the house, you stand under the tree and gobble them down.

Now with some of our eggs for scale. The plums are roughly the size of ping pong balls.

I'm gonna sort out 'eating' fruit from 'canning' fruit--the bruised/damaged ones will become jam. Also some of the nice ones will go with my husband to work tomorrow to share with coworkers.

Can't wait to taste the jam from these, so proud of my little Satsuma plum for coming through for us at last!

My Bartlett pear tree, meanwhile...

Well--it's the struggling kid of the family. This is its entire crop, but I will say it's doing better than last year. The fruit isn't much bigger than the plums, and I wage an ongoing war with coddling moths. I don't spray/treat any of my fruit with insecticides, I settle for Tanglefoot-coated muslin strips wrapped around branches at strategic spots to stop the coddling moth larvae from crawling up to infest the fruit. It mostly works, but I know I'll still find some damaged fruit when I cut these open. Not sure if I'll get enough pears to make jelly with, but we'll see. In the future I may have to cave when it comes to the pear tree and spray it when it comes time for it to set fruit.

But overall, I'm really happy tonight! The Macintosh apple tree out front has maybe a dozen apples on it--it's a struggling child, as well--but they aren't anywhere near ripe yet.

Looking forward to jam-making this weekend! 

The next day, September 29--Post script--the kid and I just picked another 23 pounds of plums, just like yesterday and the tree is stripped of fruit...so our yield is around 46 pounds of plums.

Canning, ahoy!

 

WHAT Kind Of Jelly...?

So whattaya get from 5 pounds of chokeberries?

Four pints of jelly and purple hands for a week, that's what.  It's damned tasty and unusual, I'll give it that.  I was afraid it'd be an astringent monster, but it came out surprisingly light and not tannic at all.

However, my kitchen looks like I opened an abattoir for Barney.  I'm sure it'll take a month to scrub all the purple off everything...

I Has A Crop! Again!

OK, technically probably a 'harvest', but still.

Chokeberries!

To my surprise, the two little chokeberries bushes that were planted just a few months ago produced like mad--enough to fill my big stockpot with fruit and make at least one batch of jam, I'm thinkin'!

Chokeberries are quite astringent, to the point where you really don't want to eat them straight off the plant.  And tossing a few to the chickens results in some pretty amusing grab-it-spit-it-out-and-stare-at-it rounds of chicken football as they all pass it around, until eventually one of them bypasses that whole 'taste your food' thing and just hoovers it down.

I think I waited a few days too long to pick since some of the berries are a bit shriveled, and the near 100 degree temps haven't helped, but the chokeberries should still make good jam.

Next up will be Beautyberry jam, the berries on those plants are just starting to develop and grow!

Ravens And Jam

 Well I must say that today was an odd day.

I'd stopped off at Jacobs Family Berry Farm for some locally-grown raspberries and blackberries for jam making.

Yum!

Family sternly warned to leave them alone until after I'd measured out what I needed for jam, after that they could lay into them.  I must say, that was difficult because they smelled amazing.

But a small batch of each jam was made, yay!

Even better, I got to talking with Jack, the owner, and he and I have a 'swap fresh eggs for berries' agreement!

Later on that day, we got a visit from a neighbor, who used to work for a local pizza joint and had delivered to us in the past--he remembered Nadine yelling 'Hello!' at him when he had been here.

He told my husband that he had a very tame raven in his yard and was worried that his dogs were going to get it, and asked my husband if he'd take a look at it.  My husband suspected that it was the same tame raven that had wandered into our house back on August 18th and when shooed back outside, had allowed him to hand feed it.  So he grabbed a small birdcage and went back to the guy's house...low and behold, same bird.  The neighbor calls the raven into his pickup truck, then they are able to pick it up and place it in the cage.

My husband brought the bird back here, where we all take turns scratching it on the head and feeding it goodies--it's completely tame and was obviously someone's pet.  We decide to post some notices online, husband gets on Facebook and I get on Craigslist.

After about an hour we get two calls:  one from a very nice licensed wildlife rehabber/falconer in Yerington who offers to give the bird a home, the other from a guy named Joel a few blocks away from us, saying the raven is his--kinda.  Seems it was an orphaned baby that he raised and released, it's been hanging around for months.

Joel invites us over to his house, a 5 acre spread, so we grab the raven and go--we figure it'll be pretty obvious if it's his bird or not.

Well, without a doubt he raised that bird, they know each other well.  I ask Joel if the bird has a name and he tells us, 'None that can be pronounced in mixed company.'

Sounds like a raven owner, all right!

Ravenbuddy is released from the cage, and he walks around the yard begging from everyone as we stand there talking, Joel eventually giving him a Ritz cracker from his pocket. Ravenbuddy immediately goes over to a planter and caches it.

He's still a youngster and loves attention and messing with people, but is clearly healthy and able to hold his own, so we don't worry about him.  We suspect he will continue to hang around.  While we all talk the bird takes off and makes a beeline for the neighbor's yard, who Joel tells us own dogs that Ravenbuddy loves to tease--he sits in the trees and barks back at them.

We spend about an hour visiting with Joel, who is a cool dude with an awesome house that he partially built himself and has decorated with stuff from his travels around the world.  The kid is fascinated with his fish pond, and he tells her that she came back and fish in it for catfish and the like any time she wants.

I tell him I'll be back bearing fresh eggs and we say goodbye.

I'm sure we'll see our raven around again, and we let the pizza guy know that we found the bird's owner and that he should expect to see the bird around, too.

*Insert Maniacal Laugh And Wild-Eyed Stare Here*

OK, so I may have gotten a little happy on the whole 'canning thing.

But that doesn't mean that I'm crazy--

Oh.
You know what, never mind.

Why Stop There?

Why stop with just jam when you can go completely crazy and can fresh fruit, too?
The prepared jars with cut nectarines:

 Then the sugar syrup goes in:

Sealed & boiled:

...and DONE!

The skins cooked off, but they give a nice flavor boost to the finished product.

Time to go pick more nectarines!

It's Like Music!

The sound of the freshly canned jam jars as they cool and seal themselves with that unmistakable 'tink!'

Three more batches done today, with still enough cut up fruit for at least 1-2 more batches. I have to return to the store for more sugar & lids/bands first though--I cleaned them out yesterday when I went. Actually I'm going to hit up a different store, as I'm sure the one I went to yesterday hasn't restocked yet.

AND I still have to pick more nectarines today, they're ready...

Summer!

TA DA--! Metamorphasis!

In case you've ever wondered what 35 pounds of nectarines looks like, here it is:

...that's about 1/3 of the total amount of fruit on the tree, so more of this is in our future.

It took all of yesterday to cut, pit & chop it to get all that fruit ready. Today it became THIS!

Well, part of it, anyway. This pic doesn't show it all, but today I got through about 5-6 batches; tomorrow and likely part of Sunday will be devoted to making nectarine jam as well.

I'm tired...

Strawberry Preserves, Home Movies And Personal Injury

One of my favorite thrift stores is closing--this is the second time this year that this has happened, and they are not in any way related to each other. As of June 1st the store is gone for good. It annoys me because THIS one had remained relatively inexpensive and still yielded the occasional Really Cool Goodie Thing. The only saving grace is that this week, their last, they had everything at 80% off. One of the things I scored was an assortment of large canning jars for mere pennies each. Canning jars means, of course...

...that we started off on Saturday with a trip to the local strawberry field. N. always enjoys going there and begins shrieking loudly, "Strawberry field! Strawberry field!" while we are still a block away from it. This makes us giggle and at the same time plead with her for the state of our near-shattered eardrums.

"The Before Version"

The field is nicely kept with a lovely double row of mixed wildflowers on either side of the narrow concrete walkway, flowers that are nearly as tall as I am. Clouds of honeybees wander from flower to flower, intent on the coreopsis, poppies, batchelors buttons and nigella. J. is allergic to bee stings and it makes ME so nervous as he wanders lazily along the path that I have to force myself not to grab him by the collar and seat of the pants and frog-march him quick-time past the flowers. Just beyond the flowers is a small patch of assorted beans, squash and tomato plants, all in various stages of bearing. N. is fascinated by seeing produce on the hoof, as it were.

The prices are a bit stiff but since it's the only game in town, there ya go. They have it down to a science, it's just enough to make a face at but not enough to walk away from. Then a quick stop at the market for Certo pectin, a 5 pound box of superfine sugar and two boxes of new jar lids and bands...well, maybe not QUICK since the store manager, miserable human being that he is, has decided to rearrange the store again. We collar a worker and are told that the canning supplies have been moved from the baking aisle to the hardware aisle.

Home again to the strains of the child begging for a strawberry (No, they need to be washed first--we'll be home in just a minute--I KNOW they smell good, just hold on!). Then it's time to round up the oversized kettles and huge wooden spoons, the neato special rubber coated jar-lifter tongs that make life so much easier and that special nifty flat spoon that skims away any foam that forms. When canning it is important to get everything ready ahead of time, because once you start there is no stopping.

The jars, lids and bands are washed in hot, soapy water and then left to boil their way to sterility in the big black and white spatterware enamel kettle. The berries are washed and piled into a large 1940's era yellow and white Pyrex bowl. N. has been begging to help, so she and I retire to the living room with the sparkling berries where we sit on the floor with them. I remove the stem from one and show her how to hold it in one hand, give it a good squeeze and drop it into the oversized 8 cup Pyrex measuring cup. We work surprisingly well as a team, her little 4 year old self balancing the delight of squishing the berries, with the icky mess it leaves on her hands afterwards. Trying to teach math, cooking and family traditions I go over the basics with her: we need 4 cups of crushed berries, 7 cups of sugar and one pouch of pectin to get 8 cups of preserves. While we work I tell her stories from my childhood of harvesting and canning fruit. The living room survives with no fatal strawberry stains and the kid is sent off to wash up.

Much as N. wants to, this is the part where she is NOT allowed to help, or even be near. The berries and the sugar go into the large stainless steel pot, along with a tiny bit of butter to reduce any foaming. The Baker's Sugar, really just a superfine grind, is neat since it doesn't have the sandy, gritty texture that regular sugar has. Really nice for baking.

After the berries do their bit and boil, in goes the pectin. Another minute of boiling and then it's off to the races. This batch has foamed a bit so it's skimmed, then it's ladeled into the jars within 1/2 an inch or so of the top. Check the jar threads for any residue and then fish a lid out of the pot where they seem to swim away with jerky little shrimp-like movements, slip it into place and then screw on a band. I use a kitchen towel to hold the jar and lid in place while I crank the band on tight. It never does to forget that you've just filled that jar with boiling fruit and grab it bare-handed. The the jar is transferred to the far counter and placed upside down, where it will remain for 5 minutes for the heat to work it's magic on softening the seal of the lid. Same with the rest of the jars. A small bit of leftover jelly from the pot is scraped out of the pot into a little Pyrex dish as a treat for N, and the canning implements are left to soak with hot water. After 5 minutes the jars are turned upright and left to cool.

I take N. her treat of the jelly sample and she is very excited to be tasting the end result of the morning's adventure that she helped with. The sample is also a test to make sure that the preserves will set correctly--not to stiff, not too watery. This batch seems to be fine and I sit to relax a while and wait for the musical "Tink!" of the jars as they seal themselves. It's a sound that always takes me right back to my childhood in Norco, where every summer was a festival of canning peaches, apricots, plums, nectarines, quince, assorted vegetables and bread-and-butter zucchinni pickles. The zucchinni yield at our Norco home was ALWAYS, without fail, insane. And my father was determined that nothing would go to waste, so when he bought a packet of seeds, they ALL got planted, thank you--which led to ridiculous piles of zucchini.  We canned and froze as much as we could. I never thought to ask him why he planted so many damned zucchinni plants in the first place.

While the jars cool in the kitchen I sort through some old video tapes that need work. I pop one in that I made for myself and my far-flung family members back in 1993, it's a collection of events I filmed that year. Also on this tape is a collection of family photos that I gathered from everyone, videotaped and set to music. The tape has deteriorated some and is in shockingly bad condition. J. and I talk of moving up to DVD format with this stuff and I'm seriously thinking of redoing the photos as I still have the master 8mm tape and the music cassette to work with. Time will tell.

Just we finish watching the video, for some reason known only to preschoolers N. suddenly leaps up and runs through the hallway, slips and fetches up with a truly sickening thud against the doorjamb with her face. She doesn't cry but stands up and walks quickly and directly back to me. My heart is in my throat but I try to keep the panic out of my voice as I get her to come over and let me see what she's done. She points to her upper lip which is already beginning to swell and bleed. OK, she's punched an upper tooth through her lip, not too bad, my inner voice says. I look inside her mouth and swear inwardly at the ring of blood around one of her front teeth--my years as a dental assistant leap to the fore with the cheerful diagnosis of a tooth broken off at the gumline or somewhere up inside the root. As I know from personal experience it's a painful event, especially on the Saturday night of a long weekend within days of a full moon. Any trip to the ER is guaranteed to take so long as to require a picnic basket and a change of clothes. I perform lots of dental exam techniques trying to produce the dreaded tooth wiggle or tell-tale yelp from the child, thankfully to no avail. I do find another cut on her lower lip as well though, and she is entertaining herself by listening to the funny way she talks through rapidly swelling lips. She gets a dose of children's ibuprofen and a popsicle to suck on, both of which do their trick. Seems that this time she was lucky and her lips saved her teeth--time will tell since tooth trauma like this can take days, weeks, months or even years to develop into problems down the road. *sigh*

After such an adventurous day it's time to get ready for bed, during which N. again runs through the house to the strains of both J. and I yelling for her not to.

Another near-perfect-slice day of good times and bad.

Actually, all things considered, today I think the scales have dipped in my favor a bit.