No photos today. I picked a lovely kumquat tree, about six weeks too late, but the kumquats were enormous and seedless, so it is certainly a tree we should return to in force next year. I’ll bring the fruit with me tomorrow, and we can distribute it. I’ve about got to the point where I really don’t want any more jam (heresy, I know, and I’ll make an exception when I have a bunch of ripe pears) and 35 pounds is a bit too much for me to use all up, anyway.<\/p>\n
Then I picked just half a crate of white peaches, again, maybe two weeks too late, judging from the waspy mess of squished and rotten fruit on the ground. This afternoon, I’ve been finishing the ones with bites already taken out of them, but the rest will become a large cake to take to Village Harvest tomorrow, given the white nectarine jam I just made.<\/p>\n
I did, however, make 84 ounces (that’s seven 12-oz jars) of prune plum jam with the squishy fruit from Thursday. I didn’t use pectin since I had so very much fruit, just added about half its weight in sugar (really, a bag of TJ’s organic sugar, with no measuring) and two lemons’ worth of juice, then cooked it down for 25 minutes. If I had a food mill, I’d have removed the skins, but I don’t, so I didn’t.<\/p>\n
Terry Pratchett, in Monstrous Regiment<\/i>, says something to the effect that all women can be counted on to have half an onion lying around somewhere. I’m happy that this was actually the case for me this evening, as it allowed me to make a ratatouille for dinner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"