A Day at the Vineyard and Orchard

Last week the kids were off from school for fall break and before all "the boys" headed up north for deer hunting at Grandma's farm, we decided to spend an afternoon doing one of our favorite fall outings, picking apples. Usually we have headed to Emmett in the past for our apple picking, but this year we drove just a little farther, but in a different direction, and went to Payette. What precipitated this change was that I needed to find some Concord grapes to mix with our table grapes for making grape juice. My usual supply of Concord grapes was unavailable this year and I did not want to pay $1.50 per pound that the nearby fruitstand was asking, as I needed bushels of grapes. I happened to stumble across the information for Shurtleff vineyards on the internet and discovered that they had U-pick concord grapes for $5 a bushel! They happened to be within a mile of Kelley Orchards which offers U-pick apples.

So we loaded up our buckets and boxes and headed to Payette for the afternoon. I called the vineyard first to make sure that there were still grapes available. I did not want to drive all that way and then find out that everything was picked. I spoke to a very friendly lady who gave me excellent directions and assured me that there were still plenty of grapes to be picked. She took my information as well so that we could be added to an e-mail list for future years.

The boys had a blast picking grapes and playing in the vineyard. Here is boy #1 being goofy (as usual!)

Boy #2 hiding in amongst the leaves.

They actually were quite helpful with picking the grapes. And they were so excited about the big clusters.

Here they are in the handy-dandy wagons that the vineyard provided to transport your grapes to your vehicle. They also loved just hiding under the vines and pretending to be things. Sometimes they were pokemon....

Here they are pretending to be the Dionysus. (A little bit of Greek mythology rubbing off on them.)

And having Dad with us made it more fun. Plus he has the muscles and is very handy in situations where heavy loads of fruit need to be transported!

The day was beautiful and the weather was perfect - sunny and in the mid-60's.

It only took us about 20 minutes to pick 2 bushels of grapes (4 5-gallon buckets) - and that included the boys playing a lot and me stopping a lot to take pictures. Then we headed down the road about a quarter of a mile to drop our payment in a drop box at the owner's house. They also will let you just mail them a check, but the house is so close it is really quite easy to just drop off a payment. They use the honor system, which is refreshing to see in these days.

Kelley Orchards

was just down the road, less than a mile.

This week they had Golden Delicious and Jonathon apples available for picking.

The boys once again were eager to fill their boxes.

They competed to see who could find the biggest apple (many of them were huge!)

They pretended to be various pokemon characters who pick apples with their tales, or who climb trees, and all sorts of strange pokemon things....

Delicious!

Most of the apples could be reached from the ground or with a short stepladder...

...or with a boost from dad!

In the end, I finally had to stop them from picking more because I had enough and I did not want to pay for a whole orchard's worth of apples. But they were having such fun that I think they could have picked the whole orchard! We ended up with "only" 112 pounds of apples!

We cut one up for the drive home and, man, was that apple way better than the store-bought one we had eaten for lunch just a few hours earlier.

All-in-all a rather fruitful day.

Got Fruit?

We took a little trip to Fruitland and Payette yesterday to spend the afternoon picking concord grapes and apples. The day was beautiful and it was a super fun family activity. I hope do another post about it with more pictures. We ended up spending $50 and we brought home 2 bushels (about 80 pounds) of concord grapes, 112 pounds of apples and a 50 pound bag of onions (not in the picture). That averages out to about 20 cents per pound! Of course we did have to pay for gas for our little trip, but even including gas it still makes it under 30 cents per pound. And considering that it was a fun family outing, I am not sure that I would even factor in the cost of gas.

The concord grapes are the 4 buckets in the middle, the 3 buckets to the left are table grapes from our own vines. I will mix the table grapes and the concord grapes to make grape juice (also hopefully another post). The apples will be eaten, some dried, some canned for pie filling, but most made into applesauce. (see here) It looks like I will have my work cut out for me!

Making Applesauce

Aren't they pretty? I have made applesauce before, but this is the first year I have made it using a strainer attachment for my Kitchen Aid. And let me say that it makes the job MUCH easier. Here is how i did it....

First get yourself some apples. These are from Williamson's Orchards. They sell them by the bushel using bushel baskets, so the weight will vary. I did weigh my baskets though and it worked out to around 30 cents a pound. (One of the problems with posting months after you do something is that little bits of information that i thought were stuck in my "steel-trap brain" have escaped. The trap has sprung...) Anyway, i tried to get a mix of at least two different kinds of apples. Three or more is even better. For some reason with applesauce a mix of apples works best. I don't remember what kinds, another escapee from the trap. Sorry. I will try harder next year. Maybe.


Next you want to wash those puppies real good with dish soap and water. I mean really scrub them. We will not be peeling them and will be cooking them with the skin on, so you really want to get any dirt and pesticide residue off. (Unless you like these things in your applesauce. Who am I to judge?) Since we are cooking with the skins on it probably would be even better to go with organic apples.

Now get a really big pot. I am using a canner here. Put a couple of inches of water on the bottom, 4-6 cinnamon sticks, and then fill the thing up with chopped apples. Just chop the whole apple into 4-8 pieces, depending on how big your apple is. Throw it in, seeds, stems and all. You can also sprinkle in a little lemon juice or fruit fresh at this point to keep the apples from browning too much. But it is totally optional. You are going to cook them right away, so they won't get too brown. Now bring your water to a boil, reduce the heat to simmer, and put a lid on. Stir the apples occasionally so that they all get cooked evenly. Keep simmering until they are soft.

While the apples are cooking get yourself all set up. (This is also a good time to make sure you have your canning jars clean and ready to go as well. ) Here is the attachment. It is a Fruit and Vegetable Strainer. I also bought a bigger tray to hold the apples. You will see in a minute. The cool thing about this is that it "poops" out solids I don't want (seeds, skins, etc.) and the applesauce comes out the other side. You can use it to make a bunch of stuff like tomato sauce, hummus, etc. Also if you remove the strainer portion you have a grinder that you can use to grind meats and stuff. So I should use this more than once a year. We will see....

This is how it looks set up.

Now spoon your softened apples onto the tray, turn it on, and push them down the hole with the pusher tool provided. Make sure you do NOT put any cinnamon sticks down the chute. They get stuck in the strainer and will constipate the situation, so to speak. Hypothetically speaking, of course. Not that I would ever do this....

Here is the "poop" of apple skin and seeds that comes out.

Here is the sauce. Now you can taste it and add more sugar or cinnamon if you so desire. To preserve it you would now spoon it into the size canning jar you want and process it in a water bath. For my area applesauce is processed for 30 minutes in a water bath canner for quart jars.