Monday, November 1, 2010

Apples and Autumn


Autumn, as I've probably mentioned before, is my favorite season. Perhaps it's because nights and early mornings are crisp and cold, so it's time for fires in the fireplace and wood stove. It's more than that, however. There's a sense of the need to finish outdoor projects before snow falls. We've already had the first dusting on the mountains around the valley and soon the snowline will reach the valley floor.

Days grow shorter and nights longer, and the season is a reminder of the fleeting, precious nature of life itself. The spectacle of red and yellow colors on the trees and the musty scent of leaves underfoot, crisp or sodden, mark this time as one of nature's most glorious.

This weekend we drove to our apple tree to gather a heaping boxful. The tree grows outside the fence of a farmhouse, abandoned long ago. The tree, planted many years ago, still bears a heavy load of fruit each fall. I can picture a family living here, children sent to pick the windfalls and the mother on a ladder reaching for the higher branches. The tree was smaller then. Now the highest branches are far above our heads. Armed with a cultivator to pull down a few of these branches, we fill the big box. Some apples have wormholes, some don't. It's not hard to cut out the damaged parts.

So far I've canned a load of chunky applesauce and a load of smooth. Today I'll do a load of apple pie filling. Should take the better part of the week to work through the box. The ruby red peels make jelly. The cut out parts and the cores go into the compost pile. Nothing gets wasted. The kitchen is full of the aroma of cooking apples, and I think that says autumn to me most of all.

And now, NaNoWriMo calls. Next post here will be Monday next. Happy week and happy writing to all.

5 comments:

  1. I love this time of year when we eat foods and treats not normally consumed throughout the year. The special treats are what helps make the holiday season, well ... special. We love honey crisp apples. Gala too.

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  2. You are so industrious. I don't like to cook. I think it's because I don't get any help with dishes. So to cook, I have to clean first, cook and clean last. When I was a kid, we had two apple trees.
    Nancy
    N. R. Williams, fantasy author

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  3. Send a little applesauce my way, please!

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  4. My favorite apple treats were the cloudy unpasteurized cider and the apple butter we used to get in southern Indiana. I once tried making my own apple butter and found it took much longer than I imagined. But it was so good...

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  5. Oh, it all sounds to delicious! Apples are THE very best fruit!!!

    I hope you're having a productive NaNo week.

    I'm re-signing in as a follower because a glitch in Blogger forced me to export/save my first blog then delete it. But you can't export your followers. So I'm going around to the ones I want to keep following and re-signing in.

    This link will take you to where I am now. And I'll look forward to seeing you again next week!
    Ann

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