This weekend we went to Pat and Kathy's house in Kamiah, where they are blessed with Concord grapes and another variety that is sweeter and seedless and delicious for eating out of hand, and harvested some 40 gallons of Concords which we processed into grape juice. The climate is just slightly warmer there than in Moscow, as they are down on the Clearwater River instead of up on the plateau like us.
Pat and Kathy (pictured above on the ladder and at the sink) supplied the grapes and a whole bunch of bonhomie, and we brought a lot of jars and another dose of good cheer and between us we ended up with a very large supply of frozen grape juice. To get it you cook the grapes until they've softened down into juice, seeds, and empty peels, then filter it through a colander and again through a jelly sock. That's it! It is slightly concentrated, too, so each jar goes pretty far. I think we brought home about 15 quarts and about the same number of pints. Pat and Kathy kept a good supply too, hopefully enough to last for a while. Hopefully the purple stains will come off the counter, too. Kathy swears Clorox does the trick.
We brought home some vine cuttings to try to establish our own grapes in Moscow; we'll see if that works out. Next project for our group: our chicken coop!
I made plum jam sometime in the last two weeks, fitting it in where I could, using the entire 5 gallon bucket in two separate sessions. It made beautiful, ruby-colored jam, that needed no sugar at all. So we'll eat it liberally on our toast and cereal this winter and not feel guilty, ever.
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