Grape Muffins

At this time of the year we are scrambling to keep ahead of the produce.  The Italian prune plum tree has been dealt with.  Plums halved, pitted and frozen for future Pflaumkuchen this winter.  Onions and garlic stored away.  Bean pods for dried beans spread out on trays in the potting shed.  Tomatoes mostly harvested and turned into soup, salsa, pasta sauce - but more tomatoes still out in the garden ripening.

And now the grapes!  There are signs that the racoons have been visiting - all of the easily-reached grapes are gone, but bunches hanging from the sides of the arbour which the racoons can't reach are ripe and ready to be picked.  A quick harvesting scooped up one big basket and those were stripped from the bunches and popped into the dehydrator.  One lonely bunch was left - how about grape muffins?

The Candice grapes growing on the arbour are small, tart, seedless grapes - perfect for dehydrating.  Most recipes I found on the Internet called for halved red seedless grapes.  Our grapes are the size of large blueberries, so no halving necessary.  Using my old standard recipe, I had a go at making muffins.  Recipe at the end of the post.

It's a pretty basic recipe - dry ingredients in one bowl, wet in another.  Add the wet to the dry (and dump in the grapes!) and mix only until the dry is incorporated and no more.  Spoon into muffin tins and bake at 350F for about 30 minutes or until golden brown.  They're not as pretty as blueberry muffins, but they taste great!

Grape Muffins

Dry Ingredients
2 1/2 cups flour
2 Tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3/4 cup sugar (these are tart grapes!)

Wet Ingredients
2 eggs well beaten
1 cup milk
1/2 cup oil
1 1/2 cup grapes

Grape Jelly

Having made lots of raisins and given away baskets of grapes, I was still left with quite a lot.  I swithered between making juice and jelly.  When my daughter recounted how she'd turned her grape harvest into jelly, I decided to give that a try.

The first step was to pick the grapes off the bunches and crush them.  I shortened that step by picking them into my food processor and whirring them up with the plastic blade as opposed to the sharp metal one.

Boiling the crushed grapes with a little water

Then I boiled them up with a little water (instructions I found online suggested a cup of water to 10 cups of crushed grapes) for 10 minutes.

Straining the juice

I then draped cheesecloth in a large measuring bowl and poured the mess into it.  The cheesecloth was gathered together, tied with string and finally suspended over the measuring bowl.  I strained the grapes for a couple of hours.  The resulting juice was cooled in the fridge overnight and the required amount carefully poured off leaving the sediment behind.  I needed 4 cups for the jelly.

In a large Dutch oven, I combined 4 cups of grape juice and 7 cups of sugar, brought it to a full rolling boil for a couple of minutes.  Then I added a package of liquid pectin and boiled it for another minute.  The resulting jelly was scooped into sterilized glass jars, lids added and screwed down.  I got 8 jars of pretty pink grape jelly.

Pretty pink grape jelly

I still have another basket of grapes left and these were processed to juice and will be frozen in 4-cup ziplock bags for making into jelly during the winter.  Outside I see there are still a few bunches which have escaped the ravages of the raccoons.  It's been a good year for grapes.  I have my fingers crossed for another good year in 2015!

Looking Back - 2014

Now that the main gardening season is coming to a close, it's time to take a look back at what worked, what didn't and how things can be improved.

SUCCESSES

Onions - the best crop ever!  Huge onions and only 2 transplants failed.  In view of what I discovered when I turned over this bed after harvest, I'm not sure why the onions were so successful.  The bed was full of cedar roots!  Perhaps it was the soil itself.  Last year this bed held tomatoes.  The tomatoes themselves weren't that successful mainly due to the fact that the varieties I chose weren't what I really wanted.  A lot of tomatoes fell and were turned into the soil.  So perhaps this bed got some extra nutrients other beds didn't.  Likewise, the shallots and multiplier onions were also good crops.  I have a nice basket of fat shallot bulbs and lots of multiplier onions to start next year's crop.  In addition, I planted 5 multiplier bulbs in the winter bed as an experiment.

Tomatoes - again, the best crop ever.  This time, I'm crediting the success to the varieties I grew.  Principe Borghese always gives me lots of little tomatoes for dehydrating.  Classica turned out to be a good producer as well.  The star of the tomato bed was Health Kick.  I have lots of packages of roasted tomato sauce in the freezer, 2 batches of salsa tucked away in my canning shelves and plenty of dried tomatoes in the pantry.  I'll be growing more Health Kick plants next year - not so much for myself, but because those I gave plants to had similar successes and would like more plants.

Squash - 4 Waltham Butternut plants gave me an abundance of squashes - 20 to be exact and 2 more that may yet ripen before frost.  Next year I might grow squash in the compost bin as I'm going to stop the Three Sisters experiment - more on that later.  Although my husband is not crazy about squash, I love it.  The squashes I have will keep nicely and at Thanksgiving, I'll be using at least one to make butternut squash pie which beats pumpkin pie hands down.  Recipe at a later date!

Swiss Chard - I grew about 5 each of Bright Lights and Silverado.  The Bright Lights plants have huge, colourful leaves, much bigger than the Silverado, so the production is much better on the Bright Lights.  I'll be keeping the plants through the winter.  These 10 plants have given us lots of meals and bunches to give away as well.

Strawberries - This is the first year I can really count strawberries as a success.  This was mainly due to the fact that the raccoons didn't discover them and we netted them against the birds.  We had many lovely desserts of strawberries and ice cream!  The variety is Totem and they are in one of the 4x4 beds.  This fall, I'll have my husband weed-eat the leaves off them, give them a good drink of fish fertilizer and the last of the SeaSoil so that we can have a good crop of strawberries next year.

Grapes - again, this is due to the fact that we beat out the raccoons.  This is only the third time we've done it and I can't hazard a guess as to whether next year we get a crop.  I have one quart jar full of raisins in the pantry and 6 trays in the dehydrator.  And there are lots more waiting their turn!

DISAPPOINTMENTS

Potato Grow Bags - I went into the experiment with high hopes, but this hasn't worked out.  I think growing the plants so close together doesn't give them enough nutrients.  Also, it was difficult to keep sufficient moisture on them.  I will grow potatoes again, but I'll grow in them in the raised beds instead.  We particularly liked Pacific Russet (for baked and mashed potatoes) and Seiglinde (wonderful for potato salads) and were disappointed in German Butter but perhaps that's because they were grown in the bags.

Beets - not sure why they didn't turn out the way I'd hoped.  A friend tells me her beets were disappointing, too.  Perhaps the soil wasn't rich enough.  The beets were small and didn't grow well at all.  I'll prepare the soil better next time.

Parsnips - the germination rate was very poor.  I was using year old seed and perhaps parsnip seeds don't keep well.  I'll buy new seeds for next year.

Herb Pots - another experiment that didn't turn out as I'd hoped.  It seemed like such a good idea to grow these closer to the kitchen, but I think they'd all be better for being in the ground.  I think that our deck didn't receive enough sunshine for the plants.  I'll stick to flowers on the deck in future!

Three Sisters - another experiment that I thought was working out well, but in retrospect have decided that the three plants are better off on their own.  The corn did okay except that because I was growing it with other plants, I didn't seed as much as I would have liked to.  The squash was very happy.   The beans were disappointing.  I hardly got any for picking as they were too hard to find in the foliage.  I think that next year I'll use half a bed for corn and grow a few beans in amongst them just for the stability they provide.  Squash will grow elsewhere.

VEGGIES THAT NEED IMPROVEMENT

Asparagus - my plants are nearing the end of their productive lives.  I have 2 beds a couple of years apart in age, the oldest of which is probably about 16 years old now.  We'll pull up them and replant with new stock after enriching the bed.  Then next year, we'll change the other bed.

Beans - while the beans were productive, my bean rack is too tall for me to reach them.  I'd like to set up some kind of arbour for the beans to grow on so that it will be easier to pick them.

Peppers - the main problem here was the soil in the pots.  One pot had some of the soil I used to fill the potato grow bags.  This plant (a cayenne) grew well and produced lots of attractive red peppers.  The other pots had a different brand of soil and you can really see the difference in the health of the plants.  The plants that were in the raised beds grew well.  Next year I might set aside half a bed for peppers and create some kind of plastic tunnel over them to give them more heat so they produce earlier and last longer.

We Beat the Raccoons - Mostly!

5 baskets of Candice grapes - the best harvest ever!

This afternoon was scheduled for picking the Candice grapes.  There's been an excellent crop and so far no sign of raccoons.  So out I went with my kitchen stepladder and a basket or two in hand - to discover that the raccoons had, indeed, discovered the grapes.  There were a few destroyed bunches on the ground along with a number of leaves.  Perhaps only one raccoon.  Who would no doubt tell his family to come back tonight!

This meant that we had to pick everything we wanted NOW whether as ripe as we'd like or not.  So ten minutes later using the kitchen stepladder and a taller wooden one we snipped off the bunches and filled five baskets!  There are still quite a few bunches left, but they're the least ripe ones.  I'm betting by tomorrow there won't be any grapes left!

And now the dehydrator gets into high gear.  Dehydrating grapes is a sticky business.  So far I've done five trays and each time had to pick the grapes off the trays.  Then the trays went into the dishwasher to get all the stickiness off them.  I'm wondering if a quick blast with cooking spray will make it easier and have determined to give it a try.  The fact that the grapes aren't as fully ripe as I'd like doesn't really matter.  They still make excellent raisins.

So far I have one quart jar full of raisins.  I'm sure that in a couple of days' time, it will be joined by several more.  Winter baking is going to be so satisfying with our own raisins.

Shhhh! Don't tell the raccoons...

... but the Candice grapes are ripening!  They don't ripen all at once, so I'm picking about every other day.  What gets picked goes straight into the dehydrator.

I set the dehydrator for 135F and start with 24 hours.  It usually takes longer - about 36 hours - but this way I'm keeping an eye on the grapes.  I dry them until they're really dry - and pretty hard as well.  I'd rather err on the side of caution than find out I haven't done them enough and they start to get mouldy.

When it's time to use them, I sometimes soak them in a small amount of hot water.  The water goes into the baking as well.  Candice grapes are small, pinkish and seedless.  They dry fairly quickly and I don't have to pierce them as you do with larger grapes.  When dehydrated, they have a tart grapey taste.

We have two other grapevines up in the garden growing against the fence; a purple and a green.  Because they've had competition from the cedars, the soil is quite acid and fairly dry as the cedars are greedy when it comes to water.  I've limed the soil for the last couple of years and this year, we finally have some purple grapes.  I've long since forgotten the varieties, but the purple ones are sweet and tasty.  Perhaps I'll give them some water next year even though grapes don't need all that much and I'll be sure to lime the soil again.

There are still lots of bunches on the Candice vine and I'll monitor them every day, picking the ripest bunches.  This will only be the third time I've beaten the raccoons.  It would sure be nice to get the whole crop, but I won't bank on it.  In the meantime, I'm very grateful for what I do get!

End of May - Things Are Flourishing!

This post will be mostly pictures so that I can compare end of May progress from year to year.

In one week, the Totem strawberries are plumping out rapidly and a few are starting to take on a bit of colour.  It won't be long now!

In my Tulameen raspberry jungle, flowers are forming.  Raspberries are always later than strawberries and mine aren't in total sun, so they're probably a bit later than most peoples'.

I have moved the cherry tomatoes from the deck.  They weren't getting as much sun as I'd thought they would.  The pots have been positioned in front of the tomato bed.  I bought a small pot of basil and split it into 3 clumps.  They've been planted at the front of the tomato bed as tomatoes and basil go very well together.

Flowers on Health Kick

Flowers are open on the tomatoes in the raised bed and so far all plants are looking very healthy.

The raised bed with the beans planted at the end is progressing well.  This bed houses beans and zucchini at the far end.  Multiplier onions and shallots are at the front.  In between, I've seeded second crops of carrots, beets and parsnips.  The half barrel in the front has a Sweet Million growing in it.  To the right is a bed of leeks with swiss chard at the back of it.  You can see the grapevine scrambling over the fence at the back of the garden.

I have 2 plantings of Italian heritage beans.  Both have been placed where they can get the maximum support.  In the raised bed, they are starting to climb up the bamboo poles which were placed inside their water bottle collars.  By the time they reach the end of the bamboo supports, they'll be well able to withstand the predation of wood bugs and earwigs.

We've been eating asparagus and the dill I planted in with the asparagus has provided new plants this year.  Dill and asparagus are a good pairing as the dill protects the asparagus from beetles - not that I've had a problem with beetles, but a little prevention could be a good thing.

May is such a wonderful month for flowers!  Irises, peonies, perennial geraniums are thriving in the central bed.

A ceanothus shrub in the garden is loud with bees.  Unfortunately they are all wild bees as it's been a few years since I've seen a domestic honeybee in my garden.

The Best Apple Crisp Ever!

One of the great things about having a garden is getting to cook with your own ingredients.  Today I made an apple crisp using our own stripy Gravenstein apples and the raisins I just finished dehydrating.  The apple crisp recipe I've been using for years has a short-bready type crust and it always brings compliments.  Since I didn't have any walnuts on hand, I skipped that part (the walnuts really finish the crisp beautifully) and added the raisins to the filling instead.

Gravenstein Apples

Filling:
6 tart apples
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp lemon juice

Peel, core and slice the apples into a bowl. Mix the filling ingredients together and put in a buttered oven-proof bowl.

Filling waiting for the topping

Topping:
3/4 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/8 tsp salt
6 Tbsp butter
1/4 cup chopped nut meats

Blend the topping ingredients to a crumbly consistency.  Add the nuts and sprinkle over the apple mixture.  Bake 45 minutes at 350 degrees F, or until the apples are tender and the crust is nicely browned.  Wonderful with whipped cream or ice cream.

Apple Crisp!  Yum!

Grapes to Raisins

We have a very nice Candice grape vine off the back of the garage.  It grows over an arbour which also shades the dog's yard.  And no, when grapes are ripe and in danger of falling in the run, the dog is not put in there because grapes are very bad for dogs!

We never seem to get many grapes because just when they reach ripeness, the raccoons arrive and clean us out.  The first we realize that we've been robbed again is when we hear thumping on the roof and many rapid little footsteps - and by then, of course, it's much too late.  Grapes are ripe enough when they feel soft to the touch, taste sweet and have a bloom on them.

Only once have we ever gotten grapes for ourselves.  About 4 years ago we had a bumper harvest and beat out the raccoons.  I had enough grapes to give lots to friends and to make raisins!  And this year we seem to have another good harvest, so hubby and I were out last night picking bunches which had ripened. Since there was no time to process the grapes last night and today was a busy day, the processing took place tonight.

Candice grapes washed and ready for stripping

I washed the bunches carefully and picked off wizened grapes.  I think these were exposed to the birds who were trying to get in ahead of the raccoons.  My dehydrator trays were nice and clean from last year, so all I had to do was strip off the grapes and fill the trays.  I know I should have taken more care in placing them so they didn't touch, but too bad!  If some stick together it's no big deal.  After reading up on the Internet, the dehydrator was set for 12 hours at 135 degrees F.

Stripping grapes

I still have a few of the raisins I processed last time.  Perhaps I may have dried them a bit too long, but I understand now that this makes them last longer.  I also read that if you add a wee bit of water to the raisins and give them a few seconds in the microwave, it softens them up.  I've always done it by soaking them for a few minutes in hot water and then using the hot water in whatever I'm baking.

The raisins I've gotten in the past have been superb.  Candice grapes make a really grapey-tasting raisin. Hopefully there'll be more grapes to harvest as there are still quite a few bunches up in the arbour getting riper.  It would be very nice if the raccoons gave me another raisin year!

2 Days Later:  The grapes took much longer to dehydrate than I'd expected - probably 36 hours in all.  At the end of it, though, I have a nice little container of delicious raisins to tuck away.  Here's what they look like.