Harvest Time

We are living and eating the season of harvest just as much as one can in the city. We feel rich with all of our orchard treasures: cider, preserves, apple butter, and the delicious apples themselves. This past week has been a feast and a celebration of our funny little crop.

The Apple Pie wins the prize for our greatest accomplishment. My family of origin is intense about pies (homemade crust is not optional), and at Thanksgiving and Christmas they bake cherry, pumpkin and pecan pies. But apple pie does not have a place in my history. It always sounded like so much work--the peeling, the coring and slicing. No thank you. But I decided we needed to do something with our bushel, and Amelia was fixated on pie. She wanted full participation, so I hunted down an apple peeler so she could wash, peel and stir the ingredients all by herself.

The joy was contagious. Amelia's teacher wanted one for their classroom, and her class made their own apple pie on Wednesday (Wonderful Wednesday!), with each of the children delighting over her turn at the wheel. Then last night we went to the home of our partners in picking and celebrated the first homemade apple pie in their family. It is, as my friend says, a new era.

Amelia builds an "Apple Man"

Peeling Pride

The chef with her masterpiece.

It would have looked lovelier if we had topped with white sugar instead of brown, but that's a long story.