So in response to my Glutton Part 2 post my friend Stacey told me about a local farm where you can pick your own blueberries. I was desperate to get there and start picking. I have been there two days in a row. Yesterday I went with my bosom friend, Ali, and her family (husband David and son Josh). It was glorious. So many berries and it is shameful to only have two hand with which to pick. The best part was watching Josh tag behind David like Sal does in "Blueberries for Sal" except instead of David it would be a big black bear. Josh just walked along picking berries and shoving them in his mouth. It was adorable. It was delightful. It was like a dream; surrounded with rows and rows of blueberries just picking and talking and picking and eating and talking some more.
For those 'city folk' (which I was until yesterday) here is a picture of a blueberry bush, more like a small tree.
Can you find the butterfly? He sat there as we picked berries around him. What a great perch to have!
Here is Josh picking
and eating
A delighted me with my bounty
A better picture of the bounty of yesterday
I washed all those forgetting I wanted to freeze some and you can't freeze washed blueberries so darn, I had to go back today. I convinced two other girlfriends to journey out to the blueberry farm with me. Again we just had a wonderful time catching up and picking and munching. I couldn't think of a better way to spend a hot humid Iowa morning. Now I have blueberries everywhere in various stages...
freezing
next in line for the freezer
next in line for my mouth
and one glorious blueberry pie made by me. I cannot wait to eat it.
Can you find the butterfly? He sat there as we picked berries around him. What a great perch to have!
Here is Josh picking
and eating
A delighted me with my bounty
A better picture of the bounty of yesterday
I washed all those forgetting I wanted to freeze some and you can't freeze washed blueberries so darn, I had to go back today. I convinced two other girlfriends to journey out to the blueberry farm with me. Again we just had a wonderful time catching up and picking and munching. I couldn't think of a better way to spend a hot humid Iowa morning. Now I have blueberries everywhere in various stages...freezing
next in line for the freezer
next in line for my mouth
and one glorious blueberry pie made by me. I cannot wait to eat it.
Ali called and David along with our friend Arlyn canned like 24 jars of blueberry jam and 12 jars of blueberry syrup yesterday. That is way out of my league. I am just pleased with the pie. However, I am crossing my fingers that our bosom friend status will get me a jar of jam under the Christmas tree (if there is any left by then).I have found that there is a certain magic to going to harvest a foodstuff, sweating to bring in the crop, getting your shoes wet and your hands dirty and then bringing it home and preparing it into something wonderful. I think this is what generations have felt living off the land. Oh no I may be converting...
2 comments:
How serendipitous. This morning, I went blueberry picking with a friend and her two kids, and anothe friend who is 9 years old. Mara (my 9-year old friend) and I came home with a total of 2.25 lbs. Probably could have done better in an adults-only group, since the kids had pretty short attention spans. Still, we had blueberry pancakes for lunch, made banana blueberry oat bread, and have some left for eating on cereal this week. Thanks for the tip on freezing only unwashed berries. I didn't know that.
Yes...I think you are converting. Want to go in on a farmette out here in PA, ha ha ha! I would need you here for the medical team as I am sure between Eric and I there would be many accidents :0)
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