The continuing Aga saga
Home earlier than usual because Bill had some work to do at College. Nevertheless, almost a long weekend since we didn't head back to Cambridge until this morning.
For an apple-obsessive like me, this was a weekend of epiphanies. Last weekend at the apple-tasting (yes, just like a wine tasting) which was part of Franklin County Cider Days, I was asking the sommelier, for lack of a better word, about various antique apples in the area. "One I have never found locally, at least never found anyone was actually selling fruit, is the Belle de Boskoop". "Why, there's someone just up over the VT border who sells them." At this point I went into high gear and Bill more or less had to remove me forcibly before the discussion continued beyond another 10 minutes...
The upshot is that on Saturday we drove into a remote-ish part of southeastern VT to a farm that grows something like 160 varieties of apples. I had called in advance and the owner had put together a HALF BUSHEL of especially photogenic Belles de Boskoop for me. After being, as usual, boringly informational to a couple who asked for advice (THEY had bought some Calville Blanc D'hiver, a 16th century wonder, but that's another story), I got into the car and took a bite of one of my apples...it was rather Proustian. There I was, back in the country I love (the Netherlands) on a cold snappy winter afternoon. Really lovely. The Belle (aka Schone van Boskoop or Goudreinet in her native land) is the best cooking apple in the world as far as I am concerned, and for those who like an acid apple, one of the very best table apples as well.
We also found that the farm had Ashmead's Kernel for sale--an absolutely wonderful 18th century English variety. That will be for next week.
On Saturday night I got out the quinces that I had bought last week...the entire refrigerator was scented with their unique pineapple/rose/resin aroma (fortunately the butter was sealed off). I was finally going to make that old-fashioned preserve known as "quince cheese". For those unfamiliar with the concept, a cheese, in this contex,t is the next stage beyond a fruit butter, so firmly set that it can be turned out and sliced. Similarly the name of the southern delicacy "Chess Pie" is actually a derivative of 'cheese' in the sense of a firm custard--the term was common in the 17th and 18th centuries. Quince, damson and apple, and rarely cherry, are the classic fruit cheeses. You don't find them anymore except in old fashioned English country kitchens with...you guessed it...an Aga.
I put the fruit, rubbed clean of its natural down and chopped into 8ths, in a heavy pan with a little water, brought it to a simmer and then consigned it overnight to a very slow oven. The next day the once pale-green, iron-hard quinces were deep red and soft. I put them through the medium disk of a food mill, weighed the pulp, and then combined it with 3/4 its weight in sugar which I first pre-warmed. I brought the mix to a slow boil, stirring constantly so that it didn't scorch, and then put it back into the slow oven, where it was reduced in about 12 hours to a thick mass that came away from the pan. Bill helped me to pot it up last night. By the time we left this morning, all the jars had sealed themselves and the cheese had set so firmly that it didn't even wobble. Quinces are loaded with pectin.
Now we have to wait 2 months at least and then we'll have summer in a jar......
We had our first snow on Friday night. All gone now, but lovely while it lasted. Very brilliant stars last night--they're so much more beautiful in cold, clear weather.
Bill has bought me the correspondence of the 6 Mitford sisters (Nancy, Pam, Diana, Unity, Jessica(Decca), and Deborah) and I am trying not to read all 700 pages in one gulp. There is a distant family connection....Decca (the one who emigrated to this country and wrote "The American Way of Death" among numerous other things and was a prominent left-wing activist) was a good friend of my aunt Madeleine's in Washington during WWII after her husband (Esmond Romilly) was killed in action with the British Air Force.
There we are. Nothing about weightlifting or sex, sorry. You'll have to ask that directly. ha ha ha.
For an apple-obsessive like me, this was a weekend of epiphanies. Last weekend at the apple-tasting (yes, just like a wine tasting) which was part of Franklin County Cider Days, I was asking the sommelier, for lack of a better word, about various antique apples in the area. "One I have never found locally, at least never found anyone was actually selling fruit, is the Belle de Boskoop". "Why, there's someone just up over the VT border who sells them." At this point I went into high gear and Bill more or less had to remove me forcibly before the discussion continued beyond another 10 minutes...
The upshot is that on Saturday we drove into a remote-ish part of southeastern VT to a farm that grows something like 160 varieties of apples. I had called in advance and the owner had put together a HALF BUSHEL of especially photogenic Belles de Boskoop for me. After being, as usual, boringly informational to a couple who asked for advice (THEY had bought some Calville Blanc D'hiver, a 16th century wonder, but that's another story), I got into the car and took a bite of one of my apples...it was rather Proustian. There I was, back in the country I love (the Netherlands) on a cold snappy winter afternoon. Really lovely. The Belle (aka Schone van Boskoop or Goudreinet in her native land) is the best cooking apple in the world as far as I am concerned, and for those who like an acid apple, one of the very best table apples as well.
We also found that the farm had Ashmead's Kernel for sale--an absolutely wonderful 18th century English variety. That will be for next week.
On Saturday night I got out the quinces that I had bought last week...the entire refrigerator was scented with their unique pineapple/rose/resin aroma (fortunately the butter was sealed off). I was finally going to make that old-fashioned preserve known as "quince cheese". For those unfamiliar with the concept, a cheese, in this contex,t is the next stage beyond a fruit butter, so firmly set that it can be turned out and sliced. Similarly the name of the southern delicacy "Chess Pie" is actually a derivative of 'cheese' in the sense of a firm custard--the term was common in the 17th and 18th centuries. Quince, damson and apple, and rarely cherry, are the classic fruit cheeses. You don't find them anymore except in old fashioned English country kitchens with...you guessed it...an Aga.
I put the fruit, rubbed clean of its natural down and chopped into 8ths, in a heavy pan with a little water, brought it to a simmer and then consigned it overnight to a very slow oven. The next day the once pale-green, iron-hard quinces were deep red and soft. I put them through the medium disk of a food mill, weighed the pulp, and then combined it with 3/4 its weight in sugar which I first pre-warmed. I brought the mix to a slow boil, stirring constantly so that it didn't scorch, and then put it back into the slow oven, where it was reduced in about 12 hours to a thick mass that came away from the pan. Bill helped me to pot it up last night. By the time we left this morning, all the jars had sealed themselves and the cheese had set so firmly that it didn't even wobble. Quinces are loaded with pectin.
Now we have to wait 2 months at least and then we'll have summer in a jar......
We had our first snow on Friday night. All gone now, but lovely while it lasted. Very brilliant stars last night--they're so much more beautiful in cold, clear weather.
Bill has bought me the correspondence of the 6 Mitford sisters (Nancy, Pam, Diana, Unity, Jessica(Decca), and Deborah) and I am trying not to read all 700 pages in one gulp. There is a distant family connection....Decca (the one who emigrated to this country and wrote "The American Way of Death" among numerous other things and was a prominent left-wing activist) was a good friend of my aunt Madeleine's in Washington during WWII after her husband (Esmond Romilly) was killed in action with the British Air Force.
There we are. Nothing about weightlifting or sex, sorry. You'll have to ask that directly. ha ha ha.