I had the day off from my regular job, but I stopped in to drop something off for one of my co-workers. While there I was told, “The new potatoes are in.” He meant the new crop red Norland potatoes, the ones everyone waits for so anxiously. I made sure I took a sample for further testing before proceeding to Reinland to make a few stops.
My first stop was to check in on my in-laws garden. They said i should look for any ripe tomatoes and take them since they were busy this week and couldn’t check themselves. Alas the tomatoes were still only lightly pink, but I found 4 large cucumbers that probably should have been picked a few days ago, but weren’t past prime yet. I think they are destined for relish. My next stop was to check in with Carl since he had some difficulty with uploading the latest episod of Zachries Fetalt. As I was leaving there I was told there were a few ears of early corn in the back of my car. I made sure I unloaded a few of my sample potatoes before I left.
Linda and I took a short trip over to Morden to their farmer’s market and sampled some of the wares there but realized that we already had too much in the car for our needs and left after having light meal.
Now of course new potatoes demand simple preparation. So with that in mind I set a few in a pot with a splash of water and got them simmering. While they did that I headed into the back yard where we have a growing chokecherry orchard. In the time it took to boil the potatoes I had a beautiful bucket of chokecherries with more to spare on the trees. I did notice that the crab apple tree didn’t have any fruit, but the abundance of chokecherries will compensate. We do have another late crab on the other side of the yard that seems to be doing as well as ever, but it’s a strange tree. the apples are small and really only ready in October and at that they are still tart.
It seems that all the apple and plum trees in the area are having a hard year this year. I guess our jam and jell choices this winter will look a bit different. I did get to taste stem ginger marmalade this year and I’m thinking that some of our tart crab apples will be pressed into service in an apple ginger jam to spice up the winter mornings.
Now it’s off to play with the chokecherries. Jam will be made soon.