Apple Pie Filling

I honestly still consider myself to be a newbie at canning pie filling. I use to just can the fruit in syrup and then add the remaining ingredients for a pie later. Though I have seen sites on the internet that say to can it with cornstarch, the USDA doesn't recommend this (see post on ClearJel) and I don't do it. Even after ClearJel can along I still just kept canning fruit in syrup for awhile. I guess I can be quite a creature of habit some times.


When I first tried canning , I followed the USDA instructions exactly. However I had problems with getting too much liquid in some jars and too little in other jars.

This year I decided to fill the jars the way I fill them if I am canning them with syrup. That is, use a slotted spoon to put the fruit in the jars, and then ladle liquid on top. This is pretty easy to do because the ClearJel actually doesn't thicken until the jar is cooling. It is still thin when you are filling the jars.

This worked much better for me. I am happy with the results and look forward to enjoying a tasty, hot pie when the snow is piled high outside.

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The Line in Winter

It’s hard to conjure green in January. While it dominates the landscape for most of the year, in mid-winter it is a fugitive from the cold, hidden beneath a thick blanket of snow. We’ve just had our third major blizzard of the season here at Stonegate Farm, and only the fence lines now mark the faint contours of productive land.

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Tomato-Palooza

It’s been quite a star turn for tomatoes on the farm this season.  No blight, no gummy end rot, just loose, far-reaching tangles of sweet fruit splattered across the fencerow in the orchard.  Their indeterminate sprawl has been almost unseemly, shaming the rest of the farm with an insatiable appetite for sun and sweetness.

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This Too Shall Pass

Hurricanes Irene and Lee came and went last month and ripped through the farm with blustery, sodden winds and a muddy swill of rain that’s still running down the drive.

Newly planted seeds of Fall arugula, snap peas, and mesclun greens were washed out of their beds, heading toward the Hudson.  Chickens stood out in the wind and rain, transfixed by the chaos, their pouffy feathers matted like leaves. Bees hummed in damp confusion around the hive.

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Landarbeiters

In a muddy drizzle last week, we harvested the last of the oak leaf and lolla rosa lettuce, tilled under the remaining rain-stunted eggplant and peppers, and yanked out the tangled sprawl of tomatoes in the orchard.

The normally solemn end-of-season ritual was buoyed by some cranking iTunes, although “This is the End” by the Doors didn’t do much to lift the mood.

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