Life is Just…
Written by Translator on May 30, 2008 – 6:35 pm -Here is what can sometimes happen when you are nice to your neighbors. A couple of days ago I was driving past a house of someone in the neighborhood with whom I am not acquainted. I noticed a small tree bearing fruit, which upon further examination looked like this (after cleaning):
Yes, I had found a tree full of ripe, sour pie cherries. I stopped and asked the owner if he minded if I picked some of them. He was a bit put off at first, but I explained to him that I live in the neighborhood and would bring him some home made cherry preserves. He smiled and said, “You can have all of them that you want, but please do not break off the branches of the tree by climbing in it”. I assured him that I would be careful with it, and that I had a stepladder for the high bits. He said OK, and I went back this afternoon.
In under an hour I picked what turned out to be over ten pounds (after washing, stemming, and pitting) of clean fruit. I had not fooled with cherries, other than wild ones, much because they do not grow well in Arkansas (too hot). It seems that the climate is better here in KY for them. I soon developed a method with which to remove both the stem and the pit simultaneously by gently pulling on the stem, very gently squeezing the fruit. After a little practice, I hardly ever broke off a stem from the pit. This greatly reduced preparation time.
This:
is a glass pan with the preserves in it. I am using the old fashioned method of tempering the cooked preserves overnight to plump the fruit. Tomorrow I will pack in half pint jars, process for 20 minutes in a simmering (180 F) water bath, and take four half pints to the owner for his trouble. Here is the recipe:
One quart cleaned sour cherries
4 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup water
Mix the sugar and cherries, then add the water and mix. Bring to a boil and boil for around 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Then pour into a tray to temper (after it finishes cooling I will cover and refrigerate), then pack 1/2 pint jars to within 1/4 inch, add lids and rings, then process in a simmering water bath for 20 minutes. Allow to seal, then remove rings for storage.
The rest I will cold pack into pint jars (I am out at present) to within 1 1/2 inches. I will top off with thin syrup (2 parts water to 1 on sugar), add lids and bands, then process at a full temperature water bath for 20 minutes. That will be my pie timber. You do not have UPDATE: I have no idea what happened to the last part of this sentence. I meant to say that you do not have an opportunity to find much pie material better.
See what happens when you are nice to folks? Warmest regards, Doc.
Tags: Cherries, neighbors, preserves
Posted in Diaries, Food, Recipes |
13 Comments
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Yum!
I have wild cherries here and, tiny though they are, they’re fabulously sweet and tasty. And they’re a magnet for wildlife
I swore to myself that this summer, I’d try making preserves out of them, and I still might. It would be very labor intensive, given how tiny they are - but they’re so incredibly sweet that I don’t even think they’d need sugar.
Lucky you to happen on that tree.
I really like the taste of wild cherries, and since you live near my ancestral home, I am sure they are the black ones. While it is easy to gather large quantities of them, they are just about 2/3 pit, and that pit won’t come out.
You might be better off to destem them and simmer them slowly, with just a little water, in a large vessel and just use the juice, squeezing it out through a couple of layers of cheesecloth. You can make an excellent jelly out of it, but you have to add commercial pectin.
Another thing that I can think of is, if you want the skins and pulp, to take a piece of fiberglass window screen and mounting loosely, so that it will have some “give” and rub the pulp through it. I think that this might work, but to even contemplate pitting each one individually is a Sisyphean exercise. Warmest regards, Doc.
Simmering is what I had in mind. I know what they yield will be fabulous!
It just came to mind: if you have any trimmings of cherry, apple, plum, or peach, do NOT feed them to livestock. As the leaves wilt, they release a cyanogenic material and can kill livestock. If you trim, put those limbs where stock can not get to it. Once the leaves are brown, there is not any danger. Warmest regards, Doc.
Yea, I know. Strange thing is, the horses around here gnaw on the wild cherry trees all the time and are fine. Very peculiar imo.
I happen to appreciate Sisyphus’s efforts, but I would use these cherries as clafoutis, with the pits still in. BTW, you might have to offer the cheery man a sample of your product, he may allow you, even beg you, to remove next year’s crop as well, and so on.
I’ll probably simmer them, or at least that was my plan. I’m too lazy to do otherwise!
I suspect the cherries would be too small for a clafoutis - they’re not big at all, just little tiny wild things with a killer taste. They’re so good!
The cheery man? Perhaps he was, but I really meant cherry man.
LOL! Would that you be you or my neighbor? By the way, Pink Floyd on their seminal Ummagumma album, had a cut called Sisyphus. It was excellent, but tedious. Warmest regards, Doc.
I know, and still listen to a Saucerful of Secrets occasionally.
I am so very hungry. I might have eaten 300 calories today. Warmest regards, Doc.
A similar situation happened to me shortly after moving to the country a few years ago. The women that we bought the house from had left a 20 ft. row of rhubarb. I had never eaten it before and had no idea of what to do with it. One day a visitor to my neighbour (we share the road) stopped and said to me, “That rhubarb is going to waste! Can I take some to make wine?” You can take it all, I told him. So he filled his Jeep up with all this rhubarb and a couple of months later showed up with bottle of wine. What a deal.
Oh my - rhubarb wine. I’ve never had it. Bet that had a kick!
The Trash Dude (my trash man) made his first batch of elderberry wine a couple of years ago. He told me he took a snort or two of it, and ended up in his makeshift trash truck down at the bottom of some hollow with no idea how he got there. He’s much more careful with its manufacture these days.