To finish the saga of the juicing apples, we went to the press on Monday lunchtime with our (to us) vast collection, and within half an hour were back on the road with 79 bottles of pasteurised apple juice in the boot. As two kilos of apples is needed in general for a litre of juice, we therefore managed to pick 158 kilos of apples last weekend. This is the bottling machine - not working, as when it is working we are the end of the production line taking off the bottles and packing them!
This week we have gone rapidly from summer to autumn. Last weekend we got hot and sticky picking the apples, the sun was out and during the week, when mowing, I had a long discussion across a lake with a heron. It was all glorious. Friday I was taking a half day to meet friends, and take the scenic route to Azay with a picnic to do some birding at the lake at Rillé. It started to rain as we got to the hide, and didn't stop until we got to Azay - that'll teach me to try to take time out! We were lucky in that when we went for a walk around central Chinon, it stayed dry and fairly bright however, so there is a view of the mediaeval bit of the town from by the Chateau ramparts.
The walnut harvest has now started. We are actually rather lucky in that our trees have escaped whatever it is that is turning the nuts black before they fall, and therefore rendering them useless. I show below a good nut still on the tree, and what bad nuts look like. The third picture is me after gathering a couple of kilos, taking a rest and being jumped on by two cats. Fortunately John was able to take over!
It's Christmas pudding making time - actually it is a bit late, I should have done it a couple of weeks ago, but there we go. There are some changes this year. I thought I had packets and packets of almonds tucked away, but couldn't find any at all , and as the weather really was filthy yesterday, I wasn't going to dash out to buy any more, so they have been replaced with walnuts. I couldn't find any currants in the French shops, they aren't so keen on Spotted Dick, Eccles cakes, squashed fly biscuits, and so forth, so don't see the need. I had to replace them with more sultanas. I had no fresh quince (instead of cooking apple) so had to substitute in shredded quince that had been sitting in quince eau de vie for a year making liqueur. I used candied fruit rather than candied peel and lime instead of lemon. Time will tell if all those substitutions were an error or not! Raw puddings, the hallowed steamer and the cooking - which is still going on, so no pictures of the finished articles.
Now to get back to watching the puddings cook.
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