Grape Jam
Just dropping you a line because I have a minute. Nothing is happening here, except spring, which is nice. But you know how NE Ohio spring is -- 50 and rainy one day 80 and hot then next. Not much new going on in the yard, though I got a tarragon plant. It reminds me of Poppop. And a new daylily -- pink cotton candy is its name. And of course the yellow raspberries. The grapes are rebounding -- Daddy and I didn't kill them after all. This is a grape jam year. For some reason, it is hard to find in the stores -- all you can find is grape jelly.
Grampa is in the VA long term facility in Brecksville, which isn't up to Gramma's standards, but seems clean. I haven't been there yet, but Daddy has been to visit with Gramma. Poor Grampa wants to go home and calls Gramma and begs her to take him home. It is breaking her heart to leave him there, but she realizes that until her back heals some more, she really can't take care of him herself. Daddy and Gramma are going to a care meeting on Thursday to hear what therapies they have outlined for Grampa, so we will know more then.
Mensch is back and getting acclimated to life at home as well as the US. We are all adjusting just fine, so far. He and Daddy both start credit classes next Monday and I think they both have evening classes, so I might have the house to myself. Don't know what I'll do with it, but I'll be there. Actually, if you ask either of them, they'll say that I won't be there. It seems like I have a meeting or class almost every night of the week. And they would be right. I keep committing to things, thinking, 'it's only one night a month', but all those one nights add up very quickly.
It's kind of funny. Mendon asked if we were giving him space, and I replied that I didn't think we were doing it consciously, just that we were busy living our lives.
I hope you are all well.
Comments
Are you really going to make Jam? Will you do it with the rasberries too? Are the Mulberries ripe near y'all? They are here...
Posted by: Rachael | May 24, 2004 10:34 AM
I don't know if I'll ever eat grape jam again. Last time we made it we had so much it lasted what? ten years? It felt like it never ended and by the end all I wanted was anything BUT grape jam!!
On the other hand, I wish I were there to help make it. I always loved helping make stuff - the cherry pies, jams, bread, even harvesting the berries - to me it was such an intimate experience, and are some of my fondest childhood memories. I can't believe my friends grew up not doing any of this stuff!
Posted by: Mara | May 25, 2004 6:46 AM
You know, in my vision of what life would be like when my children grew up and had children of their own, I had this image of summers and fruit coming in. I would call all the kids (you four and spouses) and invite you to a harvest fest where we all pick and process and share the fruits of our labor and have a picnic afterwards. When I think of it now, I realize that it is some sort of fantasy reaching back into the last century, not to say millenium, sort of a Norman Rockwell moment from the 30's that will never exist. But it is a fun image anyway. Yes, I did tend to over do on the whole processing thing. Like I couldn't do it unless I was making enough for several years. I am not a great fan of grape jam and I rarely eat any jam anymore, but it is Daddy's favorite. He would be happy with only grape jam, so I will make it for him. And I won't wait until I have enough grapes to make it worth my effort. I will make one batch at a time. The trick is to have my time available to make jam cooincide with the grape harvest.
I'm glad you enjoyed those times. I did too.
And I promise that I will only post this once. Sorry for clogging your blog.
As for the raspberries, well, I usually just eat them. If we have a really good crop, I freeze them on a cookie sheet and then bag them (so they don't mush) to use later in the year. I love raspberry jam, but Daddy doesn't like the seeds, so to make jam that he will eat involves straining out the seeds. So it is easier to just eat them. Now a raspberry pie is one of my favorites, especially when made the way I make my blueberry pies, with mostly fresh berries and whipped cream (and a Lactaid Pill taken before eating). The mulberries are not only not ripe, they are about non-existant. The whole tree looks really sick. I think it may be time to . . . cut it down. :-(
Posted by: Maman | May 28, 2004 10:18 AM
How sad! About the mulberry tree... not to mention the raspberry pie I highly doubt I'll get a slice of!!! Of course, if you wanted to make raspberry jam and give it as a GIFT (ahem, hint, hint, hint), I doubt the GIFTEE (ahem, hint, hint, hint) would be ungrateful. :-)
Posted by: Mara | May 30, 2004 2:12 AM
Oh, gosh! One of my favorite memories is of picking the sour cherries off the neighbor's cherry tree...and then the cherry tree we got Daddy for father's day. And making cherry pie, and pickled cherries, and cherry jam, and cherry olives (these tasted horrible but I never had the heart to say so, and the jam was so good...)
And patty pans. Do you guys remember patty pans and summer squash and zucchini? We had so many. So many. There was squash every night for what, three years? It was ridiculous. I remember it fondly, but there was just sooooo much of them.
It was a bumper crop one year, and Dave Berry ran an article on how much kids hated zucchini after their parents had grown it all summer and they'd had it at every meal, and how neighbors would leave anonymous baskets full of zucchini for neighbors they hated...I figured he must have visited our neighborhood in Mentor.
I used to pick zucchini in the mornings and leave two or three on someone's doorstep on the way to the bus, just to try and get them GONE! But there were so many. Whole zucchini would flower, grow and mature in a single day. I couldn't keep up. Those things were a plague!
But, mmmmm, grape jam, cherry jam, cherry pie, mulberry pie, mulberry sorbet...remember when we got the ice cream maker down and made mulberry ice cream? Mmmmmm. That was so good.
If it's any consolation, Maman, I had the same vision, of us all gathered at the house come fall, pickin' berries and making jam and having a hootenany, with barbecued chicken and zucchini and squash and beans and tomatoes and onions and garlic and shallots and potatoes and peppers and cherry pie and mulberry ice cream all from the back yard...
Posted by: Nathan Dornbrook | June 3, 2004 8:42 PM
Wonderful memories, all of them.
But, umm, Maman, I think it's time you put a new entry in your blog :-)
Posted by: Mara | June 4, 2004 1:44 AM
Yeah! I think so, too!
C'mon, Maman! Post something! It's been almost a month!
-Nathan
Posted by: Nathan Dornbrook | June 12, 2004 6:06 AM
I'm not suprised about the Mullberry tree...the flavor of the berries has been going downhill recently. My absolute favorite was the pickled cherries. I LOVED them:)
Posted by: Nathan Dornbrook | August 19, 2004 11:17 AM