Garden and wild food report

My fingers are stained purple and I have thorns in my thighs, but we have managed to pick enough blackberries to make 25 pints of jam. Now we turn to our garden to begin harvesting the tomatoes that will be made into pizza sauce, salsa and juice to have throughout the rest of the year. It’s been a cool summer and although it’s September, we’ve only gotten a few ripe tomatoes out of the garden so far. We’re hoping that the El Nino taking place will mean a warm dry autumn, allowing us to extend the growing season and get bunches of tomatoes out of the garden after all.

Someone nicked one of our pumpkins last week, so we’re down one. Bah. However, they’ll be cheap and plentiful come October when they’re at the farmer’s market, so we can stock up then. I’m trying not to focus on the negative. Maybe someone really needed that big, beautiful deep orange pumpkin. Or maybe they were just a piss ant.

Anywho.

We’ve been picking wild cherries, plums and currents for jams and eating fresh. They aren’t as big as the commercial varieties, but they are tastier and more fun to eat. We’ve been seeing apples on trees around town and are due for a trip to an apple orchard to pick a bunch. Jay especially likes wild cherries, and will pick a branch clean if given the chance.

All this talk about food is making me hungry. I’m going to see what I can harvest from the refrigerator.