'Tivo and another busy busy day

[altivo]

Gary had his gig at the farmers market this morning, so take care of the animals since he leaves early for that, then do some laundry and make up a shopping list, go to the bank to deposit paycheck, to grocery store to buy food for the week, home to put away food, then to the farmers market to meet Gary for lunch and help him get all his stuff back to the car. Come home, put Tess out in the pasture for the afternoon, weave on Argos' shawl while Gary takes a nap to make up for getting up so early, then while he goes out to clean stalls (today being his day) think about all the apples sitting here and make an apple pie. Wind the rest of the dyed cotton into balls so I can finish knitting the lace scarf from it. Oh, and check e-mails and LJ, respond to whatever needs it, bring Tess back in and give her grain and hay, fix dinner using as much stuff from the garden as possible, now back to weaving or maybe knitting since that has the earlier deadline. Whew.

Made the pie using Cortland apples. Those are a tart, crunchy cooking apple that's pretty good in pies and excellent for apple sauce or baked apples. They also happen to be, well, rather large. I started with three, and thought "That can't be enough" so I peeled and sliced four of them. The pie ended up five inches high in the center and I could barely get the crust sealed around the edges. Of course, they cook down as the pie bakes, but still, a whole pie from just four apples is kinda amazing. I guess you could make a pie from just one if it was a Wolf River (they are the size of small pumpkins, but have little taste really.)

All the local orchards have their signs out, and it's amusing to watch the sign wars. "Not Just Delicious Orchard" puts out signs beside the road, and "Woodstock Country Orchard" comes along and puts theirs right behind, with prices on it, only to be hidden by a larger sign from "Year-Round Orchard" (which isn't open year round, but only in September and October.) Soon it will be like Burma Shave signs, with contradictions on each one. I guess last weekend was rained out for most of them, so they have a lot of apples to sell right now. "Prairie Skies Orchard" used to sell other people's apples because their own trees weren't yet bearing, but this year I understand they have their own apples. I don't know what varieties they planted, but the Red Delicious is finally in eclipse. No one wants it any more, thank goodness, so I'll bet they have something else more interesting. Maybe even Prairie Spies. Those would be nice to have. Empires come in next week, but unless we use up what we have I may not be able to justify buying them. The Melrose or Melreuge are the last ones, first week in October, and worth the wait. I still wish for Northern Spy and Winesap, but no one seems to have good trees any more.

Oh, and while I was getting ready to go shopping this morning, the doorbell rang, something that happens about once a year out here. Both dogs started barking, I looked out the window and there was a sheriff's car in the drive. Uh oh. Quick threw on some sweats because I had been getting into the shower and went to the door. It was a deputy all right, quite a young one. He wanted to know if I was missing a dog. No, I told him, I have two and you can hear them in the house barking at you. He explained that he had just seen a smallish dog out in the road, and when he stopped to see if he could catch it, the dog ran up our drive and into the woods behind the barns. I nodded, and told him it likely belonged to the neighbors to our west (the Brits) since they let their dogs run loose all the time and they are frequently nosing around in our barns and pasture. He apologized for disturbing me and left. Being nosy, I watched out the bedroom window to see if he would go over to the Brits' to ask them, but I guess he didn't. Too bad. I don't think their dogs are licensed either.

Comments

apple question

[jenwolf.livejournal.com]

What variety of apple would be best for making jam? Last year I used MacIntosh, and they were okay, but I'd like to try something different.

Re: apple question

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Jam as opposed to jelly? Well, I haven't ever really made either one from apples. I do like crabapples for jelly, though.

In general, I would think an old fashioned cooking apple would be better. The Mac, though it makes an all right pie, is on the sweet and mushy side for baking and cooking. The larger, firmer, tarter cooking apples have more flavor, and more pectin. Since you're going to add sugar anyway in order to make jam or jelly set up, a tart apple is the way to go. Cooking apples can be hard to find today. Most orchards stopped planting them back in the 1960s or thereabouts, so you may have to do some hunting. Cortland, NW Greening, Spy, Melreuge, are the varieties I've favored. Roger Yepsen, the author of my favorite book on apple varieties, suggests the following for cooking purposes: Bramley's, Calville Blanc, Cox's Orange Pippin, Granny Smith, Grimes Golden, Hostein, Idared, Jonagold, Jonathan, Macoun, Newtown Pippin, Northern Spy, Northwestern Greening, Rhode Island Greening, Spigold, Summer Rambo, Wealthy, Yellow Bellflower, and York Imperial. If you can find any of those other than the Granny Smith and Jonathan these days, you're doing very well. Good luck, and let me know what you come up with.

Re: apple question

[jenwolf.livejournal.com]

I made apple jam for Xmas last year, and everyone loved it. There's an orchard in Nevada, IA where I can supposedly get several of those apple varieties. It's a bit of a drive, but if I can get really fresh fruit the trip will be worth it. They have pick your own raspberries and blackberries, too. Yum!

Re: apple question

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Be sure to check their picking schedule before making the trip. Since the different varieties ripen at different times, you want to make sure you can get the ones you prefer.

I love cider, both the raw and fermented varieties. Even good cider has become difficult to get these days. They insist on pasteurizing and sterilizing all the flavor right out of it.

Re: apple question

[jenwolf.livejournal.com]

It's Honeycrisp season, so we picked a few pounds of those. I also picked about twenty pounds of Jonagolds, even though they aren't fully mature yet. I'll let them sit in a cool spot for a while until they ripen completely.
We will probably go to another orchard next month to pick some different varieties, and get some cider then. I plan to call ahead and see if they will give us some pure unadulterated cider for fermenting ourselves.

Re: apple question

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Cider depends on local laws. I believe in Illinois they can't legally sell it unpasteurized, or at least I've never found a source. In Michigan we used to get the real thing, and even in the refrigerator it will start to fizz away after a week or so. Nummy stuff.

Honeycrisp are great but overpriced most places because Oprah called them her favorite apple so now everybody wants them. Eat 'em up, I find they aren't so nice if you try to keep them for long. It does seem a little early for Jonagold. I think our local place doesn't start picking those until next weekend.

[zachary-geminus.livejournal.com]

It's funny, you mention apples and I think instead of pomegranates...

Well? Pomum is Latin for apple.

I wonder how easily you could make a pomegranate pie...

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Not easily at all, I would think. Since only the red sacs around the seeds are edible, you'd first have to pick several pomegranates apart and pick out all the seed pellets or whatever they're properly called. Those are very juicy and would cook down to almost all liquid with just the seeds lying in the bottom of the pan, so I dunno how you'd get a pie from them. Jelly would be possible, I bet, and it would probably be pretty decent.

[zachary-geminus.livejournal.com]

They're called Arils, btw, and really I would think it's the same problem with blackberries and those work in pies just fine.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Actually, getting a good pie from blackberries isn't easy. I've just about figured it out, but the berries have little pectin in them so they turn to soup unless thickened with something. The trick is figuring out just how much thickening to us so the pie is neither runny nor rubbery. ;p I'd expect much the same problem with pomegranate.

I often mix blackberries with something else that makes a more solid pie, like apples. They have so much flavor they pretty much dominate the apples.

[hellmutt.livejournal.com]

Mmmm, pomegranate jelly. Blackberry jelly. That's it! Must stop reading Altivo's delicious blog when hungry!