Storing our fruit..yum yum

Well at the beginning of the year we never thought we would have so much fruit, and not have anything to do with the growing of it!

In spring we didnt even know we had a Plum tree, and only realised we had Damson trees growing in our ditch when the fruit started appearing, much to our delight!!

So the past couple of weeks have been spent making Plum jam, trying out Plum vodka and then this week I harvested the Damsons.....with help

The trees are laden down

But unfortunately most of the fruit are too high up for us to reach, even with the ladder, so we'll have to be content with 2 kg of 'em

But we dont mind really, I managed to get 11 pots of jam from them...yummy

As for the never ending fruit from the Plum tree I harvested the last of the fruit the other day, before the wind or the wasps got them. The tree gave us nearly 18 kg of fruit!  So apart from loads of jam I tried to make some Plum Compote but decided to blitz it instead and make a coulis. After trying some on ice-cream I spooned the remainder into ice cube trays to freeze

Then bagged them for use whenever we feel like some..

Its September already!

I cant believe how fast the last few weeks have gone, whats that all about?

I feel like we havent had a break, but I blame the fact we are getting an extension put onto the house for that. We have kinda been tied to the house for most of the summer.

The kids are gone back to school today and now its time to start looking towards the winter, and start storing what veg we have left.

We have to decide how we are going to store the spuds we have yet to harvest, (we have loads of British Queens still in the ground) and get them before the slugs do!!

The onions we planted late have started to fall over, and look nice and big:

The hail last wk damaged them a bit

We will have to take them out too in a week or so.
We're still learning, so everything has to be fully researched first before we go ahead and do it.

The parsnips are gonna be left in the ground for the forseeable future, and we have already started eating the turnips, and will probably leave them in the ground too for another while.

Our greatest harvest this year has been Plums and we didnt even plant the tree! have over 10kg so far..

and loads of jam made...

With Xmas presents sorted I had to find another way of using all those Plums...Last year we tried making Sloe gin for the first time and it turned out great (still have some left over). So found a recipe for Plum Vodka....

Plums, sugar, just add vodka

All shook up!

It should be ready for Christmas!