black walnuts – Lee Reich

Long-term Grapes

About a month ago, I picked a bunch of grapes as I was walking around the farmden with a friend, and handed it to him to taste. “Wow,” he exclaimed, eyes lighting up, “that really has taste.” That was the variety Brianna, one of many I grow that are otherwise not well-known, surely not to anyone who doesn’t grow grapes. My friend and I went on to agree that store-bought grapes are, “at best, nothing more than little sacks of sugary water.”

All that’s history now. Over the past month, most of the remaining grapes have either been harvested, eaten by birds or insects, or rotted, although a few very tasty berries can be salvaged here and there from some ugly bunches still hanging.

But are those grape-ful days gone yet? Years ago I read about how, over a century ago in France, fresh grapes were sometimes preserved by cutting off bunches along with a length of stem, the bottom of which was slid into a narrow-mouthed, water filled bottle. These bottles were then placed in a rack on shelves in cold storage which, where outdoor temperatures rarely dipped below freezing, was nothing more than a slightly insulated, outdoor room.

Grapes, fresh picked

A month ago, I emulated those French grape growers of yore, in this case using Corona beer bottles, three of them, three grape varieties, and my refrigerator — very decorative looking.

Grapes, after 1 month storage

For a modern version, another bunch of grapes went into the refrigerator in a sealed freezer bag. Grapes in freezer bag If any of this worked out, the plan was to use either the old-fashioned or modern method with a whole bunch of bunches in my walk-in, insulated and with some cooling or heating, as needed, fruit and vegetable storage room.

Back in the olden days, storing fresh grapes was not so rare even on this side of the Atlantic. Professor Frank Waugh, in his 1901 book Fruit Harvesting Storing, Marketing, wrote “An acquaintance of mine from the grape-growing district wrote me the other day (March 12th), ‘A neighbor of mine has one hundred tons of Catawbas still in storage.’” Probably not as single bunches on stems in bottles of water!

Anyway . . . drum roll . . . yesterday it was time to taste my stored grapes. One variety, Glenora, didn’t hold up well. The other two, Lorelei and Brianna, were very good. “Bottled” bunches were very slightly shriveled, but tasted quite good. Perhaps they would do better in the more humid atmosphere of the walk-in cold storage room. The bagged bunch, Brianna, was plump and also tasty.

Admittedly, none of the stored bunches had the crisp texture or fresh flavor of the few berries hanging on ugly bunches still outside. But all were better than any fresh grapes I can buy.

Walnuts at the Car Wash

Storage of nuts, also abundant this time of year, is more straightforward. You pick them up from the ground, let them cure in a cool place away from squirrels, then crack and eat them at your leisure.

With black walnuts, the green husks must be removed and the nuts within cleaned up. Leaving the husks to soften and darken a little makes them very easy, although tedious, to remove. Of the many suggested methods, twisting them off with two rubber-gloved hands seems most effective.

As far as cleaning up the hulled nuts, an old fashioned washing machined, earmarked only for this purpose, would work well. I don’t have one, so came up with an effective alternative.

After spreading out all the husked nuts into eight black plastic vegetable harvest boxes, I loaded them in the back of my truck. And then it was off to the car wash. A couple of rounds with the high pressure water spray did the trick. It was a messy job that I was prepared for with rain coat and pants, boots, hat, and face shield. The truck needed a washing anyway.

Spreading out the trays on the deck exposed for a few days to bright sunlight had them all clean and dry. Squirrels would normally be a threat but the deck is also where Sammy and Daisy, my dogs, spend much of their days.

Previous generation watchdogs, Leila and Scooter, on deck

Finally, the nuts were put into five half-bushel baskets for cracking beginning towards the end of December, which is about when last year’s nuts will be finished up.

Harvest Tragedy

I was never that hopeful for English walnuts here (also called Persian or White walnuts). This species is not all that cold-hardy, their blossoms are susceptible to late frosts, which are common here on the farmden, their leaves are susceptible to anthracnose disease, and the only place I had for them was near the road, along the squirrel highway (telephone, cable, and electric wires).

Still, I couldn’t resist, back in 2006, an offer of seeds for some “hardy” varieties. I planted two groups of three trees each, planning to cull out any weaker ones in each group.

All the trees grew well, and I eagerly awaited blossoms which, finally, this year, appeared in abundance. That abundance was followed by an abundance of nuts, and everything looked healthy. Then disaster, in the form of squirrels, struck. Every single nut was stripped from the trees.

Well, not every single nut. One nut was left, which I harvested, easily popped out of its husk, and let sit — cure — on the kitchen table for a couple of weeks. Then, with great fanfare, it was cracked open and eaten.

This year’s English walnut harvest

As luck would have it, I also had a bag of store-bought English walnuts with which to compare in taste. No contest. Store-bought tasted rancid in comparison.

Next year, in enough time before the nuts start to ripen, I plan to spray all the trees with a hot pepper spray.

Any other suggestions would be most welcome.

For anyone who missed my recent 90 minute webinar on GOURMET COMPOST, the webinar has been recorded and is available for $35 on-demand from Oct. 1st, 2020 until Oct. 8th for $35. The webinar covers options for compost bins, feeding your compost “pets, monitoring progress, what can go wrong and how to right it, when is compost “finished,” and making the best use of your compost. Click below to pay almost by any of a number of ways. Thank you.

Putting Summer in Jars

I’m hunkering down for winter, which includes capturing what I can of summer’s bounty in jars and dried and frozen garden produce. With this year’s hot, sunny weather, tomato plants yielded plenty of fruit — until cut short with a few nights of freezing temperatures about a week ago. Still, I have over two dozen shiny quart jars lined up on a shelf in the basement.

This year, San Marzano, which I (and most of Italy, where San Marzano canned tomatoes are labeled as such) consider to be the best-tasting canned tomato, got segregated into a number of jars all by itself. Other pluses for San Marzano is that it’s an heirloom variety, so I can save my own seed from ripe fruits, and it bears heavily over a long season on healthy, stocky vines.

A past neighbor of mine used to begin his process of canning tomatoes by alternating layers of tomatoes with salt in tall, half-bushel baskets. Other gardeners begin by peeling, perhaps seeding, their tomatoes.

Me? I opt for the quickest method possible, which is: Cut off any bad spots and drop the tomatoes into a large pot with just a half inch of water in the bottom. After being brought to a boil, the tomatoes get simmered until the volume is reduced by one-half, with less reduction for San Marzano’s because of their low water content. Then, a thorough blending with an immersion blender.

New guidelines call for keeping the acidity of canned tomatoes below pH 4.6 to prevent growth of Clostridium botulinum, aka botulis bacteria, by adding 2 tablespoons of lemon juice or 1/2 teaspoon of citric acid per quart. This is because of lower acidity of some modern tomatoes. I do so just to make sure even though my tomatoes’ acidity measured below 4.6. Finally, the canning jars go into the pressure canner for processing for 10 minutes at 15 pounds pressure.

I figure that I can chop up and sprinkle in any flavorings for sauces or soups later, in winter, when I have more time and I know the jar’s end use.

(House) Plants on the Move

I’m a little late this year in readying my houseplants for winter. I know from seasons past that when they come indoors, so do occasional pests. The pests that are most troublesome, the only ones about which I need to do something, are scale insects.

Scale insects aren’t always in evidence now but I know they are there on my citrus, bay laurel, orchid, and staghorn fern plants. By early winter, the pest becomes more obvious as occasional, small brown nodules on stems and leaves. That’s the protective “scale,” beneath which the scale insect is happily sucking away plant sap.

Scale insects have never killed my plants but do weaken them and – perhaps worse – exude a sugary “honeydew” as they suck sap. This sticky honeydew gets all over floors, furniture, or whatever is beneath the plant. And then a fungus arrives to feed on that honeydew, giving leaves a dark, smoky, haze.

Hard-shell scale on staghorn fern

My tack for scale insects is to line susceptible plants up in my driveway, then spray them with some relatively benign insecticide such as Ced-o-flora, horticultural oil, neem oil, or pyganic. I’ve been doing that for the past few weeks in an effort to get the young scales before they find shelter beneath their protective shells.

With the last spray finished, in come all my houseplants. Windows are still open at least some days so indoor air is not too different from outdoor air, easing the environmental transition for the plants.

Squirreling Away

Black walnuts are one of my favorite nuts and they’re conveniently abundant and free for the picking, at least around here. Perhaps too abundant. Once there are a couple trees, they beget more and more as squirrels start “planting” them everywhere. My vegetable garden, with it’s soft, rich soil is a favorite spot.

Admittedly, the nuts aren’s so convenient to eat. Their messy husks need to be removed. Then the nuts have to be cured in a dry, cool or cold, squirrel-proof space until around New Year’s Day, And finally, the very tough nuts need cracking. I recommend the ‘Master Nut Cracker’, in my opinion the best nut cracker for those tough shells.

Last year black walnuts were raining down all over the place here and in town. This year, probably because of last year’s overabundance, the crop is light everywhere. How are the walnuts doing where you are?

I’m lucky. One tree here on the farmden that provided most of our nuts in years past, is bearing heavily. Up to a few years ago it was useless, bearing nuts whose innards were almost always spoiled or shriveled. That might have been because of hurricane Irene back in 2011, when the nearby Wallkill River flooded its banks to wash over here and rise about four feet up that tree’s trunk.
black walnuts in jar
I cracked a few of the nuts this year to see how the nutmeats look. They’re well-filled and a nice, white color inside. But not edible, as I wrote, until they’re cured. Until January, we can enjoy what’s left of last year’s nuts.

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GRAPE and NUTS