Are Fruit Trees Worth the Trouble?

[Jared77]

Cat could you post the recipe on how you cook them and save them? We always just saved them raw with decent results but would prefer a much better alternative.

 

[so lucky]

I'm pretty sure the drought was what ruined the peach crop this year. They were dry and tasteless. Where I live there are several big peach orchards, so I know what you mean when talking about a really good peach. I just freeze them with sugar and spices for pies. And catjac, the strawberry farms here use black plastic to keep the weeds out of the strawberries. Seems to work pretty good.

 

[catjac1975]

I am not one for recipes. I boil them, skin them. check them for bugs. I cut them up, sugar the hot juice to an extra sweet taste, then add the cooked fruit. I let it soak and cool, taste it to be sure it tastes sweet. Then I freeze in zipper bags. I love finding a lost bag at the bottom of the freezer in the middle of winter. But, not a one this year due to drought. I do not spray but I would using organic sprays, but never seems to have the time.

Cat could you post the recipe on how you cook them and save them? We always just saved them raw with decent results but would prefer a much better alternative.

 

[thistlebloom]

I froze about 30 pounds of peaches this year, I just skinned them, sliced them, and froze in half gallon freezer bags. I've already been using them in peach crisps, they were plenty sweet as is. SO GOOD when you let them thaw partially and just eat them plain! Like summer.

I fear they will not last until spring at this rate :/ . But the other half of the peaches I canned. They're tasty, but I prefer the frozen ones.

 

[thistlebloom]

And another thing...
I agree that fruit trees are worth the effort. Even if you never used the fruit, you have planted a tree and that's got to be a good thing.
But to speed up the wait until you get fruit, and also make them easier to take care of, you could plant dwarfs.

 

[journey11]

I do my peaches like you do, Thistle. Sometimes I sprinkle in a little fresh fruit preserver if I can't work them up fast enough (kids!) Then I freeze them in flat layers in 1 gal. ziplock bags, so we can break them off in pieces to put into our oatmeal. Yum! Sugar usually helps extend the shelf-life in frozen foods, but I've not had any trouble with the peaches. Strawberries always need sugaring though, or they freezer-burn.

I am going to have to try the black plastic too, So Lucky. I fought and fought with the weeds this summer in my new june-bearing strawberry patch and unfortunately the weeds won. Hard to win that battle though when the DH mows "backwards" around my garden plots!!! Oh, how many times have we had that discussion?

 

[catjac1975]

Do you mean that you did not cook them at all?

And another thing...
I agree that fruit trees are worth the effort. Even if you never used the fruit, you have planted a tree and that's got to be a good thing.
But to speed up the wait until you get fruit, and also make them easier to take care of, you could plant dwarfs.

 

[thistlebloom]

Do you mean that you did not cook them at all?

For Freezing you mean?
No, I just blanch them and plunge into ice water to cool then peel, slice and freeze.
I should have frozen them flat like Journey does, that would make it easier to get the exact amount you need. Mine are in clumps, but if it's too much for a recipe the extra gets eaten on the spot!

 

[vfem]

I guess I hate saying this... but we were NOT in drought here this year. It was very close to perfect rain numbers for us. My peaches were small, but super juicy.

My grapes could have done better, but I got a 3rd vine started this year I need to move to a new spot.

I fantasize about having our own homemade fruit wines. Soon.... very soon I'll be able to dabble in wine making, and maybe even hard cider from our 4 apple trees.

 

[journey11]

V, I've made apple cider vinegar a couple of times now. The "hard" cider really just makes itself. I use a juicer to make the apple cider and put it in quart canning jars with some cloth fixed over the top to keep the buggies out and let the vinegar breathe. Nothing needs added, just stir once a day. The hard cider is what happens in between juice and vinegar. My husband looked up applejack and we thought the history on that was very interesting. Settlers appearantly didn't make any distinction between apple cider and hard cider...they just drank it anyway until it reached vinegar stage. Appearantly water was dangerous to drink (cholera and such), so apple cider was the beverage of choice. Applejack was the alcohol that didn't freeze in winter and concentrated as the ice was taken off. Even children drank a little hard cider with their meals.