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Post by elaine on Aug 31, 2019 0:10:56 GMT
Since we have a 4 day weekend I had boys to keep entertained today, so we went Apple picking today. Honeycrisps, Ginger Golds, Cortland and Empires were what was ready to pick, so we came home with 30 pounds. I have an Instant Pot full of apples pressure cooking for applesauce, and I’ll get out the dehydrator to start on the Apple rings tomorrow.
Anyone else ready for fresh apples? Can’t wait for the Staymans and Winesaps to be ready to pick in October.
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Belle
Pearl Clutcher
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Post by Belle on Aug 31, 2019 0:34:50 GMT
I'm very envious of you! Fresh apples are really a treat! Did you go to place that makes donuts and cider too?
Even though I am in WA state, most apple orchards are a 2 -3 hour drive from Seattle.
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Post by just PEAchy on Aug 31, 2019 0:40:19 GMT
I went last weekend to my favorite farm around here and got honey crisp. I'm so glad I went because they are already all gone at the farm. It's a large farm and they have many varieties, but the honey crisp go fast. They also have a sunflower patch & they were beautiful-got a lot of great pictures.
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janeliz
Drama Llama
I'm the Wiz and nobody beats me.
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Post by janeliz on Aug 31, 2019 0:54:23 GMT
We have to go up to the NC mountains to get to any orchards and the picking season seems to go by in a flash, but I love to go when I have a chance. I’m one of the few, it seems, who doesn’t adore Honeycrisps, but I love to load up on baking apples.
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Post by elaine on Aug 31, 2019 0:54:44 GMT
I'm very envious of you! Fresh apples are really a treat! Did you go to place that makes donuts and cider too? Even though I am in WA state, most apple orchards are a 2 -3 hour drive from Seattle. We didn’t get to the Apple House that makes the donuts this time out - too busy - but we do go a couple of times per season. It stinks that your apples are so far away. You’d think that you’d have some orchards closer to Seattle. One of the bonuses of living in VA is that we get most of the varieties out there and there are numerous orchards. We live just outside of DC and only had to drive 40 minutes to our favorite orchard. We’ll go back at the end of next month for the Staymans (my all-time favorite Apple). |
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Post by refugeepea on Aug 31, 2019 1:24:57 GMT
Anyone else ready for fresh apples? I love honeycrisp! We're not quite into apple season yet. I don't know of any local apple orchards for picking. It seems to be a bigger crop in central Utah. One of the few advantages of living rural, you don't go to the farmer's markets. You go to the farmer's stands on their properties.  I know of at least four within a few miles and a bunch of them all on one road 20 or so miles away. Growing up, we would pick cherries and peaches in orchards. Sadly, a lot have been replaced by homes. 
Our peaches and plums in our backyard should be ready in September! Our peach tree is sagging terribly.  We've decided to find someone to prune it after we pick the peaches. |
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Post by paperaddictedpea on Aug 31, 2019 1:38:25 GMT
Yum - I love apple season! I'm going to a sunflower farm an hour and a half away tomorrow and they also have pick-your-own apples. Only Zestar apples are ready right now, but I really like that variety so some will definitely be coming home with me. I'll visit some of the orchards closer to home over the next month or two to get more varieties.
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Post by papersilly on Aug 31, 2019 4:27:06 GMT
Ready? My apples have come and (almost) gone! Lol. Just a few large ones left on the tree. My smaller apple tree in a pot has started blooming again though.
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Post by Eddie-n-Harley on Aug 31, 2019 4:36:33 GMT
I didn't get any this week, but I saw apples at the Farmer's Market this week for the first time this season.
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Post by LavenderLayoutLady on Aug 31, 2019 11:15:17 GMT
Oh my gosh, what fun!
One of my favorite memories is taking my (now much older) kids to a pick your own strawberry patch when they were four & one. They carried their little buckets, filling them up, and eating twice as much as they collected.
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Post by elaine on Aug 31, 2019 13:34:35 GMT
Oh my gosh, what fun! One of my favorite memories is taking my (now much older) kids to a pick your own strawberry patch when they were four & one. They carried their little buckets, filling them up, and eating twice as much as they collected. DS#2 needs to taste test a tree before we pick from it, since even trees of the same varietal produce different tasting fruit - some more sweet, etc. He ate at least 6 while we were picking yesterday. I always tell them when we are checking out how many he has eaten, but since we picked and bought 35 pounds of apples, they didn’t charge us for the extras eaten. They also let us have a Smokehouse Apple - an heirloom variety that they have - not for mass picking, but in their farm store where you can buy instead of picking. I love trying different varieties that I haven’t eaten before! 6 pounds of apples got turned into applesauce last night and we are eating it for breakfast - yum! The Ginger Golds make really nice applesauce. |
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Post by papercrafteradvocate on Aug 31, 2019 13:56:16 GMT
Yum, fresh apples!!
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Post by Merge on Aug 31, 2019 14:58:28 GMT
Jealous! My family used to pick apples in the orchards in SE Nebraska when I was growing up. Unfortunately, apples don’t grown well in SE Texas, so any apples we get here had to be shipped in.
I’m just sitting here waiting for citrus season. My potted red grapefruit tree actually has two huge fruits on it. I can’t wait for them to ripen - around November.☺️
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Post by LavenderLayoutLady on Aug 31, 2019 15:04:20 GMT
Oh my gosh, what fun! One of my favorite memories is taking my (now much older) kids to a pick your own strawberry patch when they were four & one. They carried their little buckets, filling them up, and eating twice as much as they collected. DS#2 needs to taste test a tree before we pick from it, since even trees of the same varietal produce different tasting fruit - some more sweet, etc. He ate at least 6 while we were picking yesterday.  I always tell them when we are checking out how many he has eaten, but since we picked and bought 35 pounds of apples, they didn’t charge us for the extras eaten. They also let us have a Smokehouse Apple - an heirloom variety that they have - not for mass picking, but in their farm store where you can buy instead of picking. I love trying different varieties that I haven’t eaten before! 6 pounds of apples got turned into applesauce last night and we are eating it for breakfast - yum! The Ginger Golds make really nice applesauce. Fresh applesauce sounds amazing! "Taste test a tree" is my new favorite phrase! 😁 |
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Post by theroadlesstraveledp on Aug 31, 2019 22:33:14 GMT
Mmmmm apples. We haven’t gone up to Yucaipa yet but I plan to soon. Apple season just started over there as well.
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Deleted
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May 18, 2024 19:16:30 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Aug 31, 2019 22:35:23 GMT
Sounds like fun! I've never been apple picking before. Is it expensive?
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Post by elaine on Aug 31, 2019 22:56:01 GMT
Sounds like fun! I've never been apple picking before. Is it expensive? Nope! It is between $1.50 and $1.00 per pound at my favorite orchard, depending on how many pounds you pick. And it doesn’t matter which variety, so honeycrisps and Staymans cost the same as red delicious (which I don’t ever pick because I don’t like them). The apples you buy in the store can be up to ONE YEAR OLD! Fresh apples taste so much better - crisp and flavorful. They are also much higher in antioxidants than apples that have been in storage. |
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Post by paperaddictedpea on Aug 31, 2019 23:11:38 GMT
I'm currently munching on one of the Zestars I picked this afternoon. So good!
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Post by elaine on Sept 1, 2019 0:20:55 GMT
I'm currently munching on one of the Zestars I picked this afternoon. So good! Yum!  I now have 5 trays of Apple rings sprinkled with Penzey’s cinnamon drying in my dehydrator. We’ve already eaten through one of my containers of applesauce from last night. |
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Post by elaine on Sept 1, 2019 20:38:39 GMT
We came home with 25 pounds of Asian pears this afternoon! The orchard was packed and some families were checking out with 4-6 boxes a piece - each box holding approx 25 pounds of pears. I can’t even imagine what I would do with 150 pounds of Asian pears, even though I love them.
I have already processed 3/4 of the apples we picked on Friday. The applesauce and dehydrated apple rings are already half eaten. I loaned my dehydrator to my neighbors this morning; when I get it back I’ll be cranking out pear rings, in addition to more apple rings.
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StephDRebel
Drama Llama
Posts: 6,666
Location: Ohio
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Post by StephDRebel on Sept 1, 2019 22:09:50 GMT
Which orchard do you like the most? I want to take my niece soon.
How do you process your pears? My nanny used to make the most delicious sauce with them. Yum.
I'm cracking up over him taste testing the trees.
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Post by quinlove on Sept 1, 2019 22:32:53 GMT
I grew up in Michigan and loved to go apple picking. And, to the cidar mills. Actually, I think they were combined. I’m pretty sure there isn’t an apple tree anywhere near here. DFW. 🙁
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Post by elaine on Sept 1, 2019 22:55:09 GMT
Which orchard do you like the most? I want to take my niece soon. How do you process your pears? My nanny used to make the most delicious sauce with them. Yum. I'm cracking up over him taste testing the trees. For Apples, Stribling is the best, imo. They have 20 different varieties - although not all are ripe and ready for picking at any given time. Early October has the most. The are just off Exit 18 of I-66. Here is a map of the orchard: striblingorchard.com/map-of-the-orchardFor peaches, some apples, and the Asian pears we picked today, we like Mackintosh Fruit Farm. They also have fresh flowers for picking and veggies too. Their restaurant serves amazing homemade tamales and fresh soups, in addition to fresh fruit lemonades and cider. They are in Berryville off of 7 just outside of Winchester. www.mackintoshfruitfarm.com/this-week/I’m going to make pear sauce in the Instant Pot, just like apple sauce. 1/2 cup water and 1 teaspoons of Penzeys Cinnamon (stronger than regular cinnamon) per 5 pounds of fruit. I core them and roughly chunk them, but leave the peels on, because that is where most of the nutrients and fiber is. Pear and Apple rings are just cored fruit sliced into 1/4” thick rings, spread on dehydrator trays, lightly sprinkled with cinnamon, and dehydrated at 135 degrees for 12 hours. |
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Post by Lexica on Sept 1, 2019 23:57:28 GMT
I used to go apple picking in Julián with my son ages ago. Ahh, such fond memories. I love a good crisp apple! And stopping in town for apple pie was a highlight for us too. I haven’t made apple chips in ages and that sounds really good right now. I think that will be my next dehydrator project. Which apple do you think makes the best chips?
I have several kitchen appliances out today too. There are Costco rotisserie chicken bones in the Instant Pot for broth, the dehydrator is full of grapes for raisins, and I am bagging up the ground turkey with the FreshSaver that I cooked in the IP last night. I buy it in the big Costco 4-packs, cook it unseasoned, and bag it into 10 1-cup portions to freeze ready for soups, tacos, salads, or whatever. Prior to the ground turkey, I steamed a big bag of Costco broccoli and used the VitaMix to make broccoli cheese soup early this morning. That can’t be frozen, so I will be eating soup for lunch/dinner for a couple of days.
I should be be working on the final section of my front yard landscaping right now, but it is too darned hot to be hauling blocks and shoveling dirt. So, this week became a food prep week instead of a landscape week. The temperatures are supposed to be lower next week. I hope so because I need to get that front finished up and start on the backyard planter strips. I can’t wait to be finished with all this prep work and get this house listed for sale.
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Post by elaine on Sept 2, 2019 0:06:12 GMT
I used to go apple picking in Julián with my son ages ago. Ahh, such fond memories. I love a good crisp apple! And stopping in town for apple pie was a highlight for us too. I haven’t made apple chips in ages and that sounds really good right now. I think that will be my next dehydrator project. Which apple do you think makes the best chips? I have several kitchen appliances out today too. There are Costco rotisserie chicken bones in the Instant Pot for broth, the dehydrator is full of grapes for raisins, and I am bagging up the ground turkey with the FreshSaver that I cooked in the IP last night. I buy it in the big Costco 4-packs, cook it unseasoned, and bag it into 10 1-cup portions to freeze ready for soups, tacos, salads, or whatever. Prior to the ground turkey, I steamed a big bag of Costco broccoli and used the VitaMix to make broccoli cheese soup early this morning. That can’t be frozen, so I will be eating soup for lunch/dinner for a couple of days. I should be be working on the final section of my front yard landscaping right now, but it is too darned hot to be hauling blocks and shoveling dirt. So, this week became a food prep week instead of a landscape week. The temperatures are supposed to be lower next week. I hope so because I need to get that front finished up and start on the backyard planter strips. I can’t wait to be finished with all this prep work and get this house listed for sale. You are the woman! Even though you aren’t getting the landscaping done, I bet that you feel pretty good about all the food prep that you’ve accomplished. I need to put up more chicken broth - it tastes so much better than the boxed stuff. The pre-cooked ground turkey is a great idea - I may have to try that. I think that any good eating apple Apple makes good apple rings. Something with a firm texture that will stand up to drying without going mushy. I’m a big fan of large honeycrisps, especially since one raw one tend to be too big to eat at one sitting. They make nice large rings that are still a good size even after shrinking as they dehydrate. But, honestly, any apple will do. If you do Granny Smiths, you could always dust with cinnamon-sugar to balance the tartness. |
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Post by Lexica on Sept 2, 2019 0:33:57 GMT
You are the woman! Even though you aren’t getting the landscaping done, I bet that you feel pretty good about all the food prep that you’ve accomplished. I need to put up more chicken broth - it tastes so much better than the boxed stuff. The pre-cooked ground turkey is a great idea - I may have to try that. I think that any good eating apple Apple makes good apple rings. Something with a firm texture that will stand up to drying without going mushy. I’m a big fan of large honeycrisps, especially since one raw one tends to be too big to eat at one sitting. They make nice large rings that are still a good size even after shrinking as they dehydrate. But, honestly, any apple will do. If you do Granny Smiths, you could always dust with cinnamon-sugar to balance the tartness. I usually do a monthly Costco shop and then the following week becomes food prep week, so this is normal for me, I just moved it up to work around the weather. With my health issues, I never know how my body is going to be, so I’ve learned to keep my freezer filled with “starter kits” and healthy snacks so that I can whip up meals without too much effort on my bad days. I will also be packaging up grilled onions, sliced cooked mushrooms, taco soup (using either the ground turkey or the shredded chicken) and for the first time, I will be using the new egg cup thing with the IP to try those egg servings that are so popular right now. Part of the big benefit of doing the cooking marathons is less dishwashing. I usually just rinse out the IP between cooking the turkey and making chicken broth. And doing all of the onions in one batch eliminates washing the knives, cutting board, and fry pan every time I want cooked onions in something. Under ordinary circumstances, that is no big deal, but when I barely have the energy to walk to the bathroom, any trick I can use to help me run my life smoother is worth it. And you, my dear, are a HUGE motivator for me. I think we are separated sisters when it comes to our love of kitchen appliances/gadgets. I use your IP suggestions frequently and will now definitely be adding apple chips to my prep work for healthy snacking. I have one of those vintage apple coring gadgets that slice, peel (if desired), and core the apples. Then I just make one cut down the stack of spirals to give me 1/2 an apple slices in the identical thickness so that the dehydrating time is the same for the majority of the slices. Mom and I used to make these together all the time when the kids were little. Somehow we got away from apples and just focused on raisins after the kids grew up. Making these again will feel like Mom is here with me. Mom was the raisin making queen! |
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Post by penguin on Sept 2, 2019 1:16:39 GMT
elaine and Lexica, what kind of dehydrator do you have? I’ve been thinking about getting one.
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Post by elaine on Sept 2, 2019 1:34:00 GMT
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Post by Lexica on Sept 2, 2019 2:40:38 GMT
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Post by penguin on Sept 2, 2019 2:48:44 GMT
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I know of at least four within a few miles and a bunch of them all on one road 20 or so miles away. Growing up, we would pick cherries and peaches in orchards. Sadly, a lot have been replaced by homes. 
We've decided to find someone to prune it after we pick the peaches.
