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Wednesday, July 6, 2011

Cheery Cherry


We have a cherry tree. This is not it. I think I hear an echo from yesterday. This is a commercial cherry orchard. These trees are sprayed and cared for. As you can see, they are loaded with fruit.

cherry trees

We have a very old tree that would have been ripped out and replaced in a real orchard years ago. Some years it has no cherries at all, most years, just a few for the birds. This year there were lots of cherries, and the birds left me just enough. It's definitely "organic" fruit- no chemicals except drifting exhaust from the road, or bird poop from the sky.

bucket of cherries

Trust me, you appreciate food much more when you have touched every piece of fruit multiple times. Of course, cherries have a pit, and those have to be removed. For this few cherries, just doing them by hand isn't too bad.

But I remember the pitter that we had when I was a child. It was a big black cast iron thing that clamped on the counter. It had two flat plates about 5 inches in diameter with a spiral imprint on the inner sides, and a hopper. You fed in the cherries and turned a crank. The plates whirled, the cherries were flattened and the pits dropped out the bottom.

Of course, the drawback was that you had to sort the cherries well before feeding them in. When you pit cherries by hand the ones with the worms can be examined individually. Sometimes half the cherry can be salvaged. But you don't want to mash those up in the pitter, so we sorted first, and did the less than perfect cherries by hand. The really good ones went through the pitter.

The benefit was speed, the drawback was that the nice round individuality of the cherries was lost.

This year, there weren't too many worms. On the right is the pitted fruit, and the bucket on the left is the waste. Not bad.

pitted cherries

What am I going to do with them? No question at all for me. My highest cherry priority is...

cherry pie

... pie


See Rhubarb


16 comments:

Unknown said...

Oh how wonderful cherries! They say that cherries cure gout and although not many people suffer from gout it's another good reason to eat cherries!

Nellie from Beyond My Garden said...

I am glad you are keeping your semi-retired cherry tree.
nellie

Duxbury Ramblers said...

Our cherry has had plenty on and I managed a few as I pottered round doing chores, the rest are being taken by the blackbirds and starlings.

moirai said...

I'm not a really big fan of cherries. The taste reminds me of medicine...
In any case, your fruits and pie look good. =)

rainfield61 said...

You have tempted me...

Interesting Pictures said...

wonderful fresh cherries.

Secondary Roads said...

Cheery is the bright red cherry,
Its crimson luster brightens eyes.
The taste so tart brings joy to hearts,
It also makes the sweetest pies.

vanilla said...

Oh, my!
Cherry pie.
The photo spread makes me salivate.

I use the little point on the church key to pit the cherries.
Works great.

Unknown said...

Yummy! I think Cherry pie is my absolute FAVORITE! I've never had a real homemade one though. It's always been from a can.

unikorna said...

Oh how I crave for something sweet sourish..lovely lovely pie. There goes my diet..

Silvergirl said...

thats looks yummy..

Ann said...

Oh yum. Cherry pie has always been my favorite. Love it.

Rick (Ratty) said...

Just seeing that pie makes me hungry. And it makes me think that it's been awhile since I've had cherry pie.

Sharkbytes said...

polly- northern michigan is working very hard to show that cherries cure lots of things

hi nellie- i'm all for trees that want to keep on living and fruiting

carol- that's what usually happens here

moirai- everyone has different tastes- cherries are one of my favs

rainfield- i hope you would like it- cherries are such a northern treat

IP- they sure are- so much better than canned

chuck- yes and yes- i don't like pies made with the sweet ones- gotta be the tart ones

vanilla- really? adding a tool seems like to much work- i just pop the pits out by hand

mee2- oh- you must! they are really special

unikorna- sorry to do that to you- at least virtual ones have no calories

silvergirl- thanks!

ann- really high on my list too

ratty- one shouldn't go too long in michigan without a cherry pie!

dickster1961 said...

My grandmother used to have a cherry tree in her back yard. I remember as a kid reaching up and picking cherries and eating them fresh off of the tree,

Ferd said...

Mmm... Michigan cherries are the best!!! :-)