Thursday, September 3, 2009

Gathering Grapes

While Richard tore out the old shelving from the root cellar, I ran over to Mamie’s for a visit. Writing a daily blog means that I have to look for something interesting every day, and Mamie is always interesting. And I wanted to harvest okra from the Baerreis’ plants. The Baerreises said that they have more okra than they can use – which I can’t even imagine. Rachel loves smothered okra, and I’ll be seeing her this week-end. Hence, the harvest.

Mamie returned some of my canning jars. She said she knew it was a shame that I gave them to her full of food, and she returned them empty. This led to a lot of laughs about our canning experiments that had failed. Like the time she decided that she didn’t need to process her green beans for as long as the book said, and the whole year’s crop of beans spoiled. And my first attempt at pressure canning green beans when I released the pressure on my pressure cooker by running it under cold water, like my mother had always done (Of course, she was cooking -- not canning.) I didn’t know that a sudden drop in pressure would boil the water right out of the jars. Seems that Mamie and I are both students of “The hurrier I go, the behinder I get” school.

When I whined about the grape shortage, she offered me a jar of her grape juice that I could turn into jelly. I declined because I didn’t want o be greedy. After all, I had already scored a jar of Shirley’s jam with my whining. I also asked Mamie about Sumac tea. She had never heard of it, and says that she thinks Sumac is poisonous. I’ll have to check out Sumac via the internet.

I was so surprised that grape harvesting had already come and gone, it had never occurred to me to check the areas on our own property where we had previously harvested wild purple grapes. Probably because we had cleared most of the creek banks last winter, and I thought we had destroyed all our grape vines. I don’t know why I always assume that I missed the boat just because other people have reported disappointing results in some of their adventures. It’s true that Charlie’s grapes will never make it into wine bottles or jelly jars and that Shirley’s brother Dean lost his grapes to the raccoons. (Oh, the perils of low-hanging fruit!) That shouldn’t mean that I automatically accept defeat.

When I finally got home, I decided to take a walk on the creek banks to see whether I could locate a couple of grapes. There was no low hanging fruit, but I spied some grapes on the ground. I looked up -- way up. Lo and behold! There were clusters of these marvelous mountain jewels in the treetops! I was able to pick up a pint or so from the ground, and I could reach maybe another quart of grapes. Last year, Richard had risked his life on a ladder picking grapes from the treetops. But he was busily loading the trailer for a run to the county dump and recycle center. I’m a total spastic, so I stay off ladders. What to do?

Just before Richard drove off, I asked him to do me the favor of bringing his chainsaw over to the creek bank. You see, a branch of an old scrub tree leaning beside the creek was loaded with grapes -- way out of my reach. Richard always loves to rev up his chainsaw, so I had him cut down the branch. I ended up with over a gallon of grapes. I don’t know if they’re fox grapes or concord grapes, but they’ll make great jam.

Upon his return from “downtown”, Richard helped me shuck the corn. Then he took over the kitchen to make one of his sumptuous salads. The kitchen floor was still full of bags and baskets of produce, waiting for my attention.

Since Richard was still working in the kitchen, I looked online for Sumac tea information. I came on this cool website http://www.jewishnaturecenter.org/ with all kinds of nature projects, including Sumac tea information and a recipe. It seems that Poison Sumac has white berries and only grows in boggy areas. And from http:www.countrysidemag.com/issues/87/87-4/Sam_Thayer.html, I learned that Sumac tea has been called sumac-ade, rhus-ade, sumac lemonade, Indian lemonade, sumac tea. I think I like the name Indian Lemonade best.

Once the salads were chilling in the refrigerator, I rose from my internet search and tackled the most perishable produce first – the grapes -- de-stemming, washing and boiling in preparation for grinding into pulp for jam. Next came corn. I grated, blanched, and creamed corn for two or so hours, then took a break for salad eating while the corn cooled.

Returning to the kitchen, I pressed the grapes through the foodmill, dying my hands a gangrenous deep purple, then turned back to the corn. I cut the plumper half the corn off the cob for use as canned corn and then ran out of steam (my steam, not pressure cooker steam). I stuffed everything into the refrigerator, and turned off the kitchen light. It was already way past my bedtime when I collapsed on the couch to watch NCIS.

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I’ll can tomorrow... It’s only a day away.