The Apples are falling and there is a chill in the air for sure Autumn is back and along with it harvest time. We have once again been very busy at the Old Bakery converting our produce to jams and chutneys. Also freezing whatever else we could.
There is a garden store room at the back of the house, it is dark and it's flint walls keep the area fairly cool thus enabling me to store our apple crop, onions and Marrows for a reasonable time whilst we prioritise the other produce preservation.
Our Apple tree despite being hit by a late frost still produced over 120lbs of fruit. This is an excellent variety called 'Lord Derby' which starts off as a cooker then slowly matures to a sweet eating apple. In the next week I really need to start making apple sauce and slicing and freezing them for the winter crumbles that we serve our guests through November and December.
Then there were the grapes from the vines. I really worked hard on these this year. As a novice I turned to the wonders of YouTube for advice. This was helped by the fact that our office opens straight out onto the garden and so I could make quick trips in to look up on the PC how to prune and thin out.
They gave the garden a Mediterranean look and were spectacular against the red roof tiles and blue skies. I made a point of ensuring that there was a couple of bunches and just a few vine leaves artistically hanging in front of the Cottage's kitchen window to give a little exotic feel whilst the guests washed up.
Regardless of the small size of the individual grapes I picked the lot, about 14lbs worth deciding to make grape jelly from them.
Having found a suitable recipe I had to boil them down in batches as there were far too many for my preserving pan.
They may have been small but the taste was exquisite as they burst in your mouth sadly though the skin was tough and had to be irreverently ejected along with the pips. So it was either jam or juice and as jam is propbably the more stable of the two that is what I went for.
So boiled down, then the juice filtered through a muslin bag and reboiled with the sugar I produced 11 jars of Old Bakery Grape Jelly to join the preserves stall that we have set up in our porch.
We are, however, getting a little concerned because we are selling so many we believe that at this rate we will run out of stock early next year.
Still hopefully the Apple sauce and also the Mincemeat that we produce will help stretch it all out a bit longer.
Another product that I have over produced on is the humble Pumpkin. I planted 2 packets of seeds and some old seeds that I saved from a pumpkin last year in some seed trays. The only ones to germinate were the seeds from last years pumpkin. I got 5 plants and so planted them in the allotment and ended up with 27 pumpkins to my surprise.
Whilst these were not the biggest averaging the size of a small football don't be fooled by the carrot in this picture as it was really, really large and extremely tasty too.
So I used the three biggest to make soup (my absolutely favourite soup flavour), I saved two of the smallest for decoration in the house and stuck the rest on our front wall with a price on each one.
One by one they sold as every now and again a car would drive by then turn around and come back to buy one. Once again Mike's market stall was in business. I had a cunning ploy to make people think that they were selling faster than they were thus making them think Oooh, I'd better buy one now before they are all sold out. When I placed them on the wall I carefully left a space every now and then to give the image that an odd one had sold in the neat row. I know this trick worked a treat (did you see what I just did there?) because Alison came in and said wow you sold some already!
Going back to the ones that I kept back, I used an idea that Claire gave me and by cutting the top of a small Pumpkin you can make a nifty little vase for you autumnal flowers.....
Here I have used Dahlias that we grew from seed, Hydrangea flower heads and vine leaves from the garden as a base.
I'll be doing the harvest festival soon!!
All home grown.
A final thing that I have sussed out is that I can get £1 for a medium size pumpkin before Halloween. If I try to sell ALL of my pumpkins before Halloween then I can buy a pumpkin at least TWICE the size after Halloween for exactly the same value £1. Thus for every pumpkin I grow I can make TWO pumkins worth of soup!
Now they don't teach you that kind of economics at school.
More home grown (therefore free) jam, The Old Bakery Apple & Blackberry Jelly, a real authentic Autumn jam this. I think we produced 15+ jars of it.
A final indulgence. I take photographs as a hobby but have started to sell them and have happily found that I have a market for them thus giving me more confidence in producing more.
I paint and draw with less confidence and I also feel the urge at times to jot down a little prose, again with less confidence.
However on reading one of my past blogs I came across the following poem from a couple of years ago and for the first time 'I' felt that, actually, it was quite good. So I bring today's blog to an end with my own poem.....
The ticking of the clock
And despite Summers hazy lazy relaxed days,
Autumn takes over, slowly, subtlety in so many ways.
As indiscernible to perceive as the movement of a clock
whose hands steal our time away seemingly as still as a rock.
Don't be fooled by the resurgence of the rose,
It's colour and scent the essence of the garden prose.
Don't be fooled by the Ladybirds, Butterflies and Bees,
They'll all be gone soon and the message they send is but a tease.
The apples are dropping onto the dew dampened lawn,
whilst the herbaceous borders are looking weary and forlorn.
The Brambles are rotting and the silken cobwebs glisten in the cold sun,
It will not be long now, the signs are there that Summer is all but done.
So mow your last cut and prepare to battle the carpet
of brown, red and yellow leaves that will fall to mark it.
For Autumn is coming with more gust than you'll know
and tomorrow you'll be lighting your fire and comforting in the glow.
But don't be despondent all full of gloom and piteous sorrow
for there is always something to look forward for tomorrow.
The dappled sun through the conker coloured trees
and even the freshness of the oh so sharp breeze.
Filling that awkward gap between the yellow of the sun
and the cold frosty snow when we know winter has begun
Autumn serves us well and allows us to manage our seasonal shock
for whatever happens there is no stopping that slow, ticking hand of the seasonal clock.
M.Thomas
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