Skip to main content

Cherry Mania

OK, I don't know if the East Midlands is secretly the cherry-growing capital of the UK, or if it's just been a good year for them, or what, but there have been a lot of cherries around.  I only ever remembering seeing the little ornamental ones before, more stone than fruit, but these are the real deal.


It started when we went to the little playground down the road, and I noticed this tree with big black juicy cherries, right by the swings.  So next time we went, I lugged a ladder along and picked a boxful.  Wouldn't you know it, that was the one day that a guy from the council came along to pick up the litter and empty bins.  I wasn't actually on the ladder at that point, so he looked at the ladder a couple times, and he looked at me, and I'm thinking, "Hey, if you don't say anything, I'm not saying anything."  He didn't say anything.  I made those cherries into cherry sauce and we ate it with ice cream.  Yum.



Then we happened to be somewhere else (which shall remain nameless because I'm not entirely sure those trees were public property, although it was certainly public access and no one seemed to be using the fruit) and spotted some more cherry trees absolutely loaded with pretty, yellowy-red fruit.  Literally, you could pull it off by the handful, and some of it was low enough that even Toby could help.  We got about 5 boxes from one tree, and still barely made a dent in its harvest.



This is edible?
I scrounged some empty jam jars from a friend and had my first shot at making cherry jam.  That initial ad hoc attempt involved not pitting the cherries or simmering them before adding the sugar, both of which probably would have improved the final product.  I managed to skim a lot of stones off, but a lot stayed stuck in the fruit, so a bit of dissection is involved when you come to spread the stuff on your toast.

Four jars of cherry jam (with stones) and one of black cherry sauce
For my second try I found an actual recipe for Cherry and Cinnamon Conserve and spent some time perfecting my cherry-stoning technique.  The extra effort paid off and the cinnamon spiciness gives it a lovely flavour.  Also, unlike almost every batch of jam I've ever made, this one actually set within the stated 5 minutes of boiling time.  To be honest, using sugar with pectin and two lemons would probably set clear water quite happily, but since I'm usually testing for a set up to the 15 minute mark, I wasn't complaining!

Got three jars of this plus a little bowlful because I ran out of jars.

A few bags of cherries have gone into the freezer, ready for pie, muffins or this rather scrummy sounding cake.  And finally, we had cherry cobbler for dessert last night.  I halved the recipe, since it claimed to serve 8 (but we polished off the smaller amount between two and a half of us no problem!).  It tasted good but the texture and appearance wasn't quite what I was expecting.  The finished product kind of looked like lunar craters that had been used for paintball practice - not the type of dessert that makes everyone go "oooh!" when you bring it out at a dinner party - and it was quite sticky round the edges and chewy in the middle.  I understand that you can also put the fruit on the bottom rather than on top, so I'll try that next time; if that fails I shall resort to good old British crumble.

Before baking.

After baking
These purple cherries, by the way, were from another tree in the park that I noticed just as I thought we were done with cherries.  Ohhhh no.  Another two boxes made their way into our fridge.


Cherry-pickin' hand

Cherry lipstick!

And now, if the amount of green fruit on the bushes is anything to go by, I think we will have a bumper blackberry harvest by the end of August.  Any offers of empty jam jars much appreciated!
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mr White Watson of Bakewell

Once upon a time, back in 1795 or so, lived a man who was always asking questions.  The kind of questions like, "Why is glass transparent?" or "Why do fruit trees grow better in that place than in this place?" or "What does the earth look like underneath the surface?"  This last question was one that he was particularly interested in, and he went so far as to work out what the rock layers looked like where he lived, and draw little pictures of them.  Now he was a marble sculptor by trade (as well as fossil hunter, mineral seller, and a few other things) so he thought it would be even better to make his little pictures in stone.  That way he could represent the layers using the actual rocks they were composed of.  Over the course of his lifetime he made almost 100 of these tablets, as he called them. Then he died.  And no one else was quite as interested in all those rocks and minerals as he was.  His collection was sold off, bit by bit, and the table...
Post a Comment
Read more

Laid-back Lille and Bustling Brussels

After a night in a tiny AirBnB in Canterbury , where there were chocolates on the table and artwork on every inch of the walls, we boarded a ferry with an absolute minimum of fuss, enjoyed a smooth crossing of the channel, and were deposited in the decidedly unscenic surroundings of the port of Dunkirk two hours later. Once we got past the cranes and shipping containers, though, the countryside was flat but pleasant. We stopped at a small town called Cassel, reached by cobbled roads winding up a hill. On the summit was an old windmill and a topograph telling you the distances to various improbable places; St Omer may have been visible in the haze, but Manchester was surely over the horizon.  In Lille, we found our apartment, unpacked the luggage (one rucksack apiece), and set out to find food. Our first choice was fully booked, so we embarked on that kind of aimless wandering where everyone is hungry and no one wants to actually choose a restaurant. We reached a Lebanese place call...
Post a Comment
Read more

Preparing

Graham and I have a small difference of opinion when it comes to cleaning for visitors.  He thinks I have perfectionist tendencies.  I think I'm doing the bare minimum.  After all, I have to at least pick up all the toys and clean up that pile of crumbs that keeps appearing under Toby's dining chair, don't I?  And while I've got the vacuum cleaner out, the living room and hall always need doing.  And there's no way our guests want to see all that dirty washing up, so I'll just do that.  And wipe all the counters.  And file all those pieces of paper that have been sitting there for weeks.  And... what?  Perfectionist?  Me? Of course, this may be one of those male/female divides.  Most of my female friends regard having guests over as an opportunity to make the house look reasonable for at least a few hours.  Because all that clutter just builds up.  A pile of paper there, a stack of laundry waiting to be put away, those o...
1 comment
Read more