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| ... shades of the past ... ... whomever in their right mind cans nowadays ... |
1. Finding a neighbour who is willing to have you come and pick the apples from her tree. Then gathering up your children to make this a fun family project. Then how about leaving the area under the tree cleaner than when you began picking apples.
2. Having another neighbour who is willing to lend you her juicer for steaming the apples. Then cleaning up that steamer and getting it back in good condition to the woman who shared it with you.
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| ... crab apple juice waiting to be processed ... |
3. Cutting all of the apples to put in the juicer. The French-speaking neighbour said that she read the instructions in English, did not understand them, and so when it said to take off the stems, she cored all of her tiny apples first. Mary and Leo did not make that mistake. Leo did throw out any of the apples that had living worms in them, all the while knowing that worms floating at the bottom of tequila is a plus.
4. Collecting the bottles from all of the corners in the house to use for the canning project, figuring out how much juice you really have, and then seeing how many more bottles you need to buy. A lot of complicated math formulas can be used here.
5. Measuring the sugar, stirring in the pectin, pouring the product into the bottles that are now clean and on the counter.
6. Doing a cost analysis on the product. Ours came to $3 for one 2 cup jar. We did not do an analysis on the time we used. After all, it was just for fun.
If someone gives you a bottle of their crab apple jelly for Christmas, think of it as a great gift.
None of ours will be going out of here in that fashion.
Arta
Wyora's apple butter is what I remember with great delight and fondness. We picked the crabapples from Aunt Dorothy's tree. We went every year to get those free crabapples.
ReplyDeleteI had forgotten about apple butter. After we finished steaming the apples to get the juice, Leo ran the pulp through someone else's machine that will churn out just the pulp for apple sauce, so that is what he has. I think he will have to add a lot of sugar to make it palpable, just as we had to add a lot of sugar to get that crab apple jelly.
ReplyDeleteWhen all of the jellies and jams are counted, I am still going for strawberry jam as my number one favorite topping on a piece of whole wheat bread that has been toasted.
I love crab Apple jelly! Mñna
ReplyDelete