Reception Pound Cake and Apple Juice

It must have been a pathetic sight, me sitting in the rain chopping apples and blowing my nose. I have had a cold that won't quit and two large crates full of apples that won't get pressed on their own. With a few sun breaks, I thought today would be my chance. I should have weighed the crates to tell you how many apples you need to make a gallon of juice. Let's just say.....a lot. This is my second batch of juice this year. And besides sneaking a few hot cider drinks out of the batch, I canned the rest today. My first attempt at canning juice so the results my vary.

Our compost if full of apple cores and pulp and each time I add to our compost pile, I am reminded of the hours spent on the apple juice project. So glad I won't be doing this again for another year. I think bribery of friends and family will be in order next time.

The rainy season in Oregon has started and I can't help but feel down. As true for many, this is not my favorite time of year. There are only so many days I can be holed up in my house reading books and sipping on soup to make myself feel better. I think Roscoe, one of our border collies, would agree. He doesn't read, although he has had the taste of a good book in his mouth on many occasions, but he does take a lot of coaxing to go outside for a bathroom break. He gingerly picks his paws up as he slowly creeps through the yard while finding a convenient spot to mark. I wouldn't be bothered by this unless I didn't have to stand with him in the rain holding his imaginary hand all the while. But the dogs had fun outside running around the property today. Here they are post playtime, basking in the sun on the couch.

My cold is a huge setback these days because I feel like a sick puppy with a headache and a smoker's cough that only seems to be soothed by cups of tea and shots of hard alcohol. Each day I have been hoping to be of more help to Ron and assist in projects. But my haze has slowed me. With summer over, I see we didn't do half as many of the outdoor projects I was hoping to accomplish. I think I thought that two people could get boatloads done on 5 acres by themselves. I guess I forgot about work, school, date nights and two high energy border collies demanding attention. And I still think about kids.... Jeez! But I also sit and stew about what I should be doing with my life. Probably a waste of time on many days since I accompany it with coffee/tea or wine, when I am well, along with cake or cookies. And speaking of cake, I recently made my mom's "Reception Pound Cake." I don't know the history of this cake except that it tasted a lot like pound cake and was often served at my mom's many parties. She has always been an incredible host and she would bake late at night after work for work programs and house parties. This and her "7-up Cake" bring back so many childhood memories of being the kid wandering around with punch in my hand and stealing cake from the table while adults spoke about work and things that made no sense to me. I used to sit at the top of the stairwell and listen in sometimes, but mostly disappointed with what I heard. No drama in their lives...... Here is the recipe with a picture of what is left of ours today. Just don't tell her I gave it to you. ;)

Reception Pound Cake
2 1/4 Cup unsifted flour
1 1/2 Cup sugar
1 tsp grated lemon, lime or orange rind
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 Cup sour cream
1 Cup butter, softened
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 eggs

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a fluted tube pan or two loaf pans. Blend all ingredients until moist. Beat batter at medium speed for 3 minutes. Pour batter into pans. Bake for 55-65 minutes. Glaze while still warm or cool completely and sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Glaze
1 Cup powdered sugar
1 or 2 Tbs lemon juice.

Blend until smooth.

Don't try this at home

It has been awhile since I have written a blog so for all of those loyal readers (maybe even one of you??) here is the latest update. So far "farm living" has been good with a few challenges, including a coyote moving in, and an array of projects being added to the list. Ron and I have slowly started our little wine collection and we tired of the existing wine shelves in our house that were slanted and ugly. Being ever so crafty, Ron began the quest of making our very own wine racks. It has been months in the making but Ron first envisioned a rack for over 200 bottles. I think we currently have maybe 60 bottles but it would give us the dream big attitude for our future wine collection. Ron did the research, measured bottles and went at it. I don't know if anyone else has taken on such a project but as Ron best put it, "Don't try this at home." For those unfamiliar with the style of rack we were hoping to have we wanted it to look something like this:

Not as many bottles, but you get the idea. Each rack has little pieces of wood that cradle each bottle. Ron's first attempt at making these could have possibly involved surgery. As he was trimming the wood with his saw, the wood, he then realized, had a crack and half shot forward and the other half at his belly. Luckily no wounds but a nice big bruise. At this point, the project took a bit of a hiatus. Here are examples of the little pieces.

After a few weeks, Ron was back at it. Excited on seeing the progress I visited Ron in our shop. He nailed each piece together and stained all of the wood.

His progress was amazing. It was coming together! Our wine room was on its way! But then the text messages started. "Can you bring me a gin & tonic please?" These text messages became more frequent as the days passed, until finally, Ron was done. "I know I said I'd make a rack for over 200 bottles but forget it. We are settling for a rack with 108." Ron was done and while we know we will need more racks one day, they will be purchased. But the results are fantastic. Check out our recent version of our wine rack and room.

One image shows that Ron is building shelves in the back of the wine room. Here we will store overflow of jam, other preserved items and a place to hang cured meats, which we have been dreaming about. Meanwhile, I have been fussing with our fruit trees.

This year we had quite the crop load of apples and pears. Here are some things I have learned about having fruit trees. 1. Learn how to prune. - Ron has been working on this project. I have no clue but must learn so that he can build more wine racks for me. :) 2. Learn how to maintain them once fruit arrives. - Even though we have enough apples to make 1,000 pies, a lot of them have encountered worms. 3. Drop fruit? - Me being in the wine world knows the importance in a vintage for dropping fruit in order to ensure good quality grapes for those left on the vine. Do we do this with apples and pears? 4. Bake, bake and make juice. - I'm kind of sick of fruit desserts at the moment. So what do you do with boat loads of fruit? As I mentioned in item 4, bake, bake and make juice. Well, first I made pear jam. I know. It sounds so weird. And as I was making it, I thought, "What the hell am I doing?!" But the end result was fragrant and delicious. A perfect thing to slather on scones. Just haven't made the scones yet but someday. Next came the pear galette. Then pears in salads. Pears with cheese. Okay, time for a break from the pears. Apple time. Ron and I sampled many from each tree. Some were good, most were lackluster and some were pretty much mush. But we have so many, what do we do?!! Enter Little Red.

Little Red is my neighbor's apple press. I don't know what they call him but Little Red seemed like an appropriate name. And I needed a name for him as we became quite intimate with each other. I spent HOURS on an afternoon cleaning him and learning to assemble him. Little Red had a companion, which I almost did not borrow. Note, if you want to make juice and you are borrowing equipment, DO NOT TURN THIS OBJECT DOWN WHEN OFFERED. I almost did and I'm so glad I didn't. Enter Little Red's companion, the grinding machine.

This bad boy can chip and mince like nobody's business. (Great for grape samples too!) When I mentioned the hours I spent with Little Red, yes there was a lot of cleaning involved but what I really meant was I spent hours chopping apples until I got a blister on my hand from the repetition of chopping with a pairing knife. I thought I was all set when I picked probably 10 pounds of apples. But no! After chopping the fruit and then grinding it, I was left with little to work with. So I picked, chopped and ground more apples for a few hours before I made probably half a gallon of juice. I even threw in some pears because I was sick of putting them in pastry dough. The juice that trickled out of Little Red was the reward, however. I was going to ignore the fact that most of our apple trees are still fully loaded but Ron told me he would assist in the next batch. My next project is canning the juice. And maybe eventually we will make our own hard cider. As labor intensive as it was, I have been thankful for my hot apple juice drinks with mulling spices and knowing it all came from our property. I will be relieved to not be picking apples and pears as fast as I can in the next week or so though. Until next year, Little Red.