Mother nature loves us, but only because we love her, reciprocity works wonders. Our yard and garden enjoy the earthly blessings of “volunteers”. We have kale growing all over the place, and dill, among other things. Lucky volunteers are the crab apple trees. There are four of them growing in our yard right now. These are not vegetables, but they are produce, so I am including them in my Vegetable Chronicles series.
Two have grown up by the trunk of the ash tree in the front yard. The ash tree was killed by the Emerald Ash Borer, and was felled by the hydro people. The trunk remains, and next to it two enterprising yellow crabapple trees have been flourishing. A few weeks ago we harvested a small proportion of those little crabapples, steam juiced them, canned the juice (sour!!), and made Apple Butter with the pulp. The apple butter has a real kick to it, which I like a lot.
Another volunteer apple tree grows at the base of the pine tree beside the driveway, in the front yard. I remember when it was only inches tall, we discussed pulling it out, but did not. It is now thriving and producing small red crabapples. Two or three years ago I made Apple Butter from the crabapples harvested from this tree. There were two 500-ml jars, and it is almost gone now. These apples are much sweeter than the little yellow crabapples, the juice made from them is more distinctly apple flavoured, and I anticipate the Apple Butter will not have a kick to it.
The fourth “volunteer” apple tree has not produced apples this year, although some years it does. It was growing at the back of the yard when we bought the property. Those crabapples are much larger and sweeter than the the little yellow ones, and today’s harvested small red ones.
I suspect there is a fifth “volunteer” crabapple tree, only about three years old. It grew as a “weed” just on the other side of the back fence, so was on the neighbour’s property. They left it there and now it is twenty feet tall, but not yet producing apples.
This morning Attila picked all of the little red apples within reach on the tree beside the driveway. The blossom ends were cut off, then the whole apple, stem and all, went into the stream juicer. There were enough apples to fill the steam juicer twice. When the first batch of apples are soft, they they are added to a large stock pot, the juice is put into large measuring cups. Then on to the second batch.
The juice will be canned. It is not terribly sweet, and it has a nice taste to it.
The cooked apples will go through the manual food mill, to produce apple sauce. The applesauce will be cooked overnight in crock pots, with sugar and spices, to give us Apple Butter.
This whole process will only cost the price of the sugar, spices, and electricity used to produce the juice and the Apple Butter.
Foraging food from chemical free land is still possible, at least on our land. When we lived in the little city we foraged apples from an abandoned apple orchard, a few bushels. They were not sprayed, so that work was involved to cut out worms and bad spots, but the resulting product was well worth the effort. I notice that quite an interest in urban foraging has developed in the little city, but we are far, far away now and cannot participate in that group.
My Granny and Grandpa were able foragers. Often I went out to pick wild strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, and chokecherries with them. I enjoyed going out to pick high bush cranberries with my Grandaunt after the first frosts, she knew the best places!
Would we process these little apples if we were still working? It is not likely, as local commercial apples are readily available. The whole day will be spent on these small apples, the yield will be small. I have trouble seeing food go to waste, so in retirement I have the time to turn foraged produce into delicious healthy food.
Worldly
Weather
16°C
Date: 5:00 PM EDT Wednesday 7 October 2026
Condition: Light Rainshower
Pressure: 100.5 kPa
Tendency: Falling
Temperature: 16.0°C
Dew point: 11.1°C
Humidity: 73%
Wind: SSW 16 km/h
Visibility: 24 km
Quote
“We know what a person thinks not when he tells us what he thinks, but by his actions.”
Isaac Bashevis Singer
1904 – 1991
I like quotes that affirm that actions speak louder than words.