The Best Ride Ever!

Grandpa Dale with Adam on the tractor.

The last couple of weeks we have had some very hot weather in the 90's followed by some much cooler weather. I have been very busy canning that I have not done much in my own garden. However, we were able to visit the country garden last Friday. We had such a memorable day that day out on the "farm." It was so special because it was Adam's first real tractor ride. At first he wanted to sit in the trailer in back of the tractor but as soon as he saw grandpa start up the tractor he wanted to ride up front with him. Later, after the ride Adam said "That was the best ride ever!" It was so sweet to hear those words. It made me think about a lot of things and how really this life that we have really IS "the best ride ever" and we should enjoy every day and every moment!

Suburban Garden:

Although I have not had much time to get out into the yard and garden at our house, there are still many pretty flowers blooming right now. I am amazed especially at the large flower bushes that have grown in the side yard. They have come into full bloom and every day they are full of honeybees buzzing about! The bees really love these flowers! Those plants are ones that I bought at the Oregon City Farmer's Market when we used to have a booth there from a lovely lady named Alita. She grew some amazing plants. We are so sad that she passed away a while back because she was such a talented gardener. It makes me smile though to look at the flowers that she grew in my garden.

A hydrangea bloom in the front yard.


One of our honeybees on a flower in the side yard.

Country Garden:

We had an amazing visit to the country garden last week. Everything is progressing well and there should be a good harvest of tomatoes as well as other things very soon. My mom has already been preserving a lot of the vegetables from the garden and apples from the orchard. I took home another large bag of apples from the orchard as well as two quarts of blackberries that I picked to make another batch of jam. My mom has done an amazing job of canning and freezing the harvest already this season.

We realized that we have already made a lot of yummy things with all of the apples from four trees in the orchard and we still have four more trees to harvest from! Wow! We are going to eat well this winter! Here is a sampling of our apple harvest so far:

My Mom made:

11 gallons of cider ( besides the 2 we took camping, we have drunk some, and the rest is canned).

41 quarts of applesauce, canned

6 pints apple-ginger preserves, canned
Pie slices for 9 pies, frozen

I made:

1 gallon of cider (with Adam's help)
20 pints of applesauce, canned
6 quarts of apple pie filling
3 pints of ginger spice apple butter
2 pints + 7 half pints apple blackberry jam

I will write later about all of the other vegetables and other things we have preserved this season.

Here is some more news from the country garden from my mom Serena Johnston as well as some photos from our day there:

We have 8 apple trees, including two old ones that do bear well from time to time. Both old trees are very tall, and are difficult to prune or shape up, as we try to do with the other apple trees. The Baldwin is the one we have harvested any time there are apples on it, and it is a late apple, not ready yet. It is just at the edge of the orchard, next to the south-facing slope that goes down to the pond. The other tree is on the slope itself. We harvested apples from that tree this year for the first time because before, it was enveloped in shade from the fir trees that had taken over that area. In the last three years we have done a lot of brush removal there, and the tree had a wonderful harvest of apples this last week, for the first time. It just shows what a little care can do! We don't know what kind of apples they are, but they are medium size, yellow, and sweet, mild apples that are ready at just about the same time as Gravensteins. We shook the tree and picked up the apples, since it is too tall for us to pick. We made about 5 gallons of cider from this tree.

The Yellow Transparent is the first apple tree to bear, and we made cider from it as well. Last year I made applesauce from it, as it was the only tree with many apples on it, but this year the Gravensteins looked abundant, so we decided to use these apples for cider and got 6 gallons, two of which we took camping.

The Gravensteins bore very well this year. I made 41 quarts of applesauce, and froze pie slices for 9 pies, and apple-ginger preserves, about 6 pints worth.. I know you also made applesauce and pie filling, and then we even had enough to make about 1 1/2 gallons of apple cider. Oh, and I believe you were considering making apple butter with some. I made a lot of applesauce, as I have learned over the years to make more than needed since some years you don't get any. Weather or something seems to sabotage best efforts, sometimes. :-)

So, that is the harvest from 4 of our 8 apple trees. The others look like they have plenty of apples, and we intend to use them for more cider.

We have two dwarf Bartlett pear trees, and both bore heavily this year. I have got them spread out on newspapers to ripen, as of course we picked them at that delicate stage between green and ripe, so they don't turn to mush in the middle. Two large buckets are going to you to make canned pears, and I will make a lot of dried pears and maybe even some canned pears. It will be interesting to see how many we get. (We have other pear trees that we will harvest later, which are primarily fresh-eating pears, and some that last into the winter. With care, we can eat them fresh into 2012.)

In the orchard the Italian plum tree is loaded with fruit. We expect it may be ready by this weekend, or early next week. I plan to dry some, but may want to make some plum syrup, as you have done before. It is one of Dad's favorite syrups.

We also got Montmorency pie cherries and some wild cherries. I don't recall if you have written about these before, but I think I have 3 or 4 quarts of pie cherries and one of wild cherries. For the wild cherries, we harvested many more, but I got sick and wasn't able to process them. I found a recipe for extracting cherry juice from wild cherries, which I will do if I am ever that lucky again. Their flavor was delicious, so the juice should be too.

Our boysenberries did well this year, and we are trying to get some of the new vines to root-tip so we can get another row started. Besides the ones we ate fresh, we also made some jam.

As for the garden, I have been harvesting green and wax beans. The wax beans were a bush variety, and I didn't get so many. about 1 1/2 quarts. I think the quantity is party on account of the corn, as I planted it nearby and it shaded the beans. I had thought the beans would be harvested before the corn got so tall, but owing to cool weather, things did not go according to plan. The green pole beans are midway through harvest, if we continue with some decent weather. I have got approximately 4 quarts of those so far.

The broccoli almost surprised me, as it is some much earlier than the other cole crops. In fact, one head went to seed. I managed to get the rest of them, and every time I go out I find a few side shoots, which I fix and add to the latest freezer bag. Next year I hope to get more going at once, as it is so useful.

The green peppers have been producing, although if we had warmer weather the harvest would be better. Only about 6 so far, but there are small ones that a little hot weather could encourage to a larger size. They are nice to freeze, so I just put a gallon bag in the freezer, and when I harvest some I just wash them and drop them in the bag. We also planted jalapenos and red Italian sweet peppers, and some are maturing, but we haven't picked them yet.

Oh! I nearly forgot, peas. I put about 5 quarts of Amish snap peas in the freezer, and managed to save the dry ones for next year's seeds.

Tomatillos are wonders, as they grow with hardly any encouragement and bear profusely. I just put a 2 gallon bag in the freezer and after I pick some I take the husks off, wash them, and drop them in the bag.

Cucumbers have been slim pickings, largely because of where we planted them. I amended the soil with rotted chicken manure and compost, and they emerged and grew well in the wet part of the summer. Now that we are in the dry part of the year we have run ourselves ragged trying to keep them watered, and finally realized that the damaged fir tree behind the garden must be absorbing all the water and nutrients, as I have only gotten enough for three pints of pickles. Not worth the bother to do this year.

That corner of the garden has really struggled, and it took us the whole season this year to figure it out. We will decide what to do this fall, but it may mean removing that tree (the top is broken out and it is forming two tops, so it isn't a good prospect anyhow), moving the blueberries ( in the same struggle as the cucumbers, and we lost two bushes), and amending the soil there to some semblance of fertility. We also noticed that of the two grape vines there, the one nearest the tree had lots of grape clusters, but the grapes have not developed as the ones on the same type of vine, but further from the tree, have done. Just goes to show you need to consider plants/trees outside a garden for concerns other than shade, I guess. Probably most gardening areas don't have this problem, though, as I know large fir trees are not as common in other locales.

The potato vines are dying, and we have had several meals of potatoes. They have turned out well so far - large and well shaped - so we hope for the best when we do the main harvest.

As you will notice above, I do mention turnip greens, but not the turnips. They are full of little worms, so the chickens are getting those. I did some reading on the problem, and learned that turnips do not perform well for organic gardeners and can be expected to be wormy. Well, since the chickens like them we will still have some benefit. :-) Next year, though, we won't be planting any.

There are some harvests that we have yet to take. One is lima beans. I planted a bush variety, and they have lots of pods on them, but the pods are still flat. It remains to be seen, but since they are shaded by the corn and the weather has turned cloudy and much cooler, who knows.

I also planted watermelon and cantaloupe which were billed as doing well in cool weather. They do have small fruits on them, but vary in size from golf ball to child's large rubber ball. I think they are suffering the same problem as the lima beans.

I still have rutabagas, carrots, cabbage, and parsnips growing, and all are doing well. I will be harvesting some of our lovely basil soon as we will use some of it with the sun-dried tomatoes in olive oil, and some for making pesto.

It is still too soon to tell on corn, Brussels sprouts, and cauliflower. The sprouts are still pretty small, and the cauliflower hasn't produced a head, so I am doubtful that it will. I think cool weather and shade conspired against the production we would have liked from sprouts and cauliflower, but we will know better next time. The corn grew mightily (as Adam could tell you, it looks like a forest), and the ears are beginning to fill out, but here we are halfway through September and haven't had any ripen yet. I am keeping my fingers crossed, as we are so close.

The zucchini has been good, though. Last year was so dismal we only got a few. I have put one quart of slices in the freezer, and have made 9 1/2 loaves of zucchini bread, besides enjoying it in meals and sharing some with you.

The winter squash is also remaining to be harvested, as is the pumpkin. I planted two kinds of winter squash, and so far see one Hubbard type (sweet Meat) and several of the Butternut. The Hubbard appears to be nearly mature, but the Butternuts are still green; ditto the pumpkin.

Last but not least are the tomatoes which are finally ripening. The plants are loaded, so unless the weather turns suddenly cold, we should be able to harvest a lot of them. So far we have dried some - probably 7 to 10 pounds worth, which of course doesn't amount to much once they are dried, but they'll certainly be delicious mid-winter when we can taste their real tomato flavor.

We have been eating fresh tomatoes for lunch and dinner for about a week, and I hope that next week I will have enough to do some canning. I notice that each time I go to the garden there are more and more tomatoes in various stages of ripening, but of course unless we get another burst of warm weather, they will take their time.

That's about it! Also, besides what we have frozen or canned or dried, we have enjoyed peas, green beans, greens, zucchini, tomatoes, broccoli, bell peppers, blackberries, boysenberries, apples, pears, and cherries fresh and in season. Can't get much better than that!

Photos of the Country Garden:

A sunflower in the country garden.

An ear of corn forming on the corn stalk.

A pumpkin forming on the vine.

Finally- some Tolly's Sweet Italian peppers!

Lots of large tomatoes on the vine!

A large squash blossom.

Making Apple Cider:

Adam washing the apples before we made cider.

Adam loved to put apples into the hopper of the cider press.

Adam enjoying a glass of fresh apple cider.

Here are two recipes for some preserved I made this past week. Next week I am going to work on canning some pears and maybe making some pear preserves and other things with the lovely pears that I got from the country orchard.

Ginger Spice Apple Butter:

Chopped apples cooking into apple butter.

This is a recipe that I found online but I added more spices to it.

Ingredients:

• 12 cups tart apples, peeled, cored, cut into 1-inch chunks
• 1 1/2 cups apple cider
• 1/2 cup (packed) golden brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons minced crystallized ginger
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon cloves
  

Preparation:

1. Bring first 4 ingredients to boil in saucepan, stirring. Reduce heat to medium; simmer until apples fall apart, stirring occasionally, 10 minutes.

2. Purée in processor in batches with ginger,cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. Return to pan.

3. Partially cover apple butter; simmer over medium heat (sauce tends to splatter) until reduced to 2 1/2 cups, stirring occasionally, about 20 minutes.

4. Put hot apple butter into hot, sterilized jars, seal. Then, process in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes.

Blackberry Apple Jam:

A half pint of blackberry apple jam that I made.

This recipe comes from my mom's British canning book called "Home Preserving and Bottling" by Gladys Mann.

Ingredients:

6 cups of apples, pared, cored and sliced
2/3 cup water
juice of 2 lemons
4 cups blackberries
8 1/2 cups sugar

1. Simmer the apples in water in lemon juice until tender, about 15 minutes. Add the blackberries and sugar and boil quickly until setting point is reached.

2. Put hot jam into hot, sterilized jars, seal.

Enjoy every day of this life that really is "the best ride ever!"