The garden itself is now fenced as we decided to go totally free range with the ducks and chickens and THAT meant we needed to fence the food garden from their 'helpfulness'.
Good year for pumpkins, summer squash, tomatoes and herbs like basil and parsley especially. Not so good for eggplants and capsicum.. lots of gray days and rain seemed to slow them down a lot.
But right now i am getting a head start on processing apples. We are going to have a MAGNIFICENT crop and that means.... getting an early start with some of the older apple tree's from around the property before the orchard apples hit peak ripeness .... which is usually after the first frost but i suspect this year might be a little earlier.
The Apples - I rinse and put whole into the steam canner.
Boil up the water and start collecting the lovely yummy juice.
Canned Apple juice.... (when you open these mid winter you can have it hot or cold and mix with 2 parts water to one part juice)... Sunshine in a Jar!
Once finished collecting the juice i then put the pulp leftover seeds and skin and all into the food mill.....
The bottom is filled with lovely thick apple pulp that i then can cook and spice for apple butter or just put straight into the dehydrator for fruit leather...with no added ingredients -. the seeds and skin waste goes to the chickens.
Wrapped to stop it absorbing moisture i put it in a container in a dark cupboard or freeze it for extended periods for mid winter snacking.
Thanks for reading.
