Adventures In Apple Experiments
Apples Wildflower Style!
Just sitting here after the rain… Alone, with the smell of apples, molasses, maple sugar, and cinnamon, wafting through the house, getting caught in the air bubbles of the old barn wood beams of the kitchen… Holding the fragrance so it lasts longer than you would think it should… The beautiful aroma, mixes with the smell of cold New England, spring rain and damp that remains from the passing rain shower. It’s nice here in the quiet, examining my own mind and the ego that is uniquely mine, for a few moments.
Remove the skin and the core.
My mother has left, gone home to the ocean where she prefers to be…. Where the sea birds scream and the ocean speaks in a voice that sounds oddly like my forest singing with the wind. Mom was a huge help. We were able to get a bunch of apples processed. We filled the entire Excaliber! It took a while both of us at our respective cutting boards. We put on nice music and we got to work. We chopped soooooo many apples it was almost scary. We decided to try a couple new experiments.
Mom, helping me chop apples.
We made a lot of plane apples for drying. We cut the skin off as instructed…. But then we tried something different just to satisfy curiosity. We left the skin on to see what might happen! So in a few hours we should know. I tried another experiment, Wildflower Homestead Candy, Apple, sprinkled with molasses sugar, maple sugar, and cinnamon. I think it will come out fabulous. It seems to be doing just fine in the dehydrator with all the rest of it. But now there is nothing more I can do, as the sun is beginning to set and half the day running necessary errands vital to the farm, doing a little yard work, and working in the kitchen I am pretty tired…
My experiments and standard fare in the dehydrator.
I think being able to experiment in my kitchen like a mad scientist in his lab is one of the greatest parts of homesteading. I feel happy mixing my ingredients and applying my tools and seeing what shakes out. Everything becomes an adventure.
Thank you for visiting my kitchen lab of curios….
Please, be a regular guest. 🙂
This has been a lovely adventure thank you for joining me.
And look, the clouds are returning soon, more rain, water for berry bushes still sleeping.
Amanda of Wildflower Farm
Tags: ag, agriculture, agro, airbnb, apples, B&B, bed and breakfast house, country treats, Dehydrating fruit, dehydrator, farm, farm blog, farm wife, farm wife blog, farmer, farming, farmstead, food, fruit, homestead, homestead blog, homestead diet, homestead eats, homestead farm, homestead wife, homestead wife blog, homesteader, homesteading, house wife, housewife, housewife blog, inn keeper, inn keeper's blog, life style, massachusetts, New Endland Homestead, new england, new england farm, new england homesteading, old fashioned house wife, old fashioned housewife, old fashioned housewife blog, old fashioned lifestyle, simpler living, subsistence, travel, wildflower farm, Wildflower Farm dried apple candy
Wildflower Farm, is a small New England homestead, B&B and AirBnB, in the Baystate. We came out here 7 years ago, when we returned from the better part of 10 years as peripatetic aristotelian nomads, for my husband's post docs. Upon our return, we had a plan. We had a lovely home. Everything was so clear. Then, I got sick. Things I used to eat all the time during our travels elsewhere in the world and even here before I left almost 10 years earlier made me ill. It took a couple trips to the ER and a trip to specialist... It became clear, something had changed in the way food is processed in this country since last I lived here. Some off label things was inevitably going to be my demise.
My husband and I looked around to see the clear path we were on, had exploded in front of us. We decided we had to create a new path for ourselves. We put children on hold. We found a small piece of land with a house we loved in a rural suburb in a right to farm area. I began researching how to do it ourselves. Grow it ourselves, make it ourselves, survive on our own as much as possible. We bought the property, and began plotting a new course. One that didn't involve off label chemicals. Closer to nature, with a lot more DIY, gardens, and animals for the products they provide. We created a life we loved though it hasn't always been easy and has of course come with compromise with each other, and even with ourselves.
Our family thought we had lost our minds. What were we doing leaving the city? We had no idea how hard this would be. They thought we would be back in 6 months. That was over 7 years ago, now. We have been making it work. They were not wrong, it isn't easy. But has anything worth doing ever been easy? And for us, avoiding as much store bought food as possible was simply necessary so I could live given how sick I was getting.
Then Covid hit.... We were lucky to have this place. It has allowed us a lot less need for public use territories which has kept us a lot safer and spared us much of the risk others face daily. This place, has given us a privilege through this of great meaning to us. To be of use in a difficult time. We have been able to help friends family and even strangers in need when things couldn't be found on store shelves. Or money was tight due to not working, rent being due and a child at home, or some other draining situation. We are so very grateful to have been able to not be helpless like so much of society through this miserable time. Our families, got used to it some time ago, us being out here. They made peace with it the day there was no bread and they had to ask me for some. Or when fresh vegies were rotten due to supply chain issues but they could find plenty in my garden.
Wildflower Farm, was a place I dreamed of. One of those sweet pastoral dreams a city dweller grows up knowing will never come true, that became unavoidable when I became ill. I never expected to get to do this. I never thought I had what it takes to make this work. I have learned pacing myself is important, compromise is critical, hard work never ends, burn out is real so breaks are just a necessary evil.
We are not fully self sufficient, but we work hard in that direction as we create a new path through life for ourselves, always reaching to do even more ourselves and to get closer to the ideal we envision. We are however far more self sufficient than many in this world. 7 years in, we continue to learn and grow in this homesteading lifestyle. We welcome comments and advice and ideas and questions.
We welcome visitors from all over to our home with strict covid policies in place. We spend our time learning to live all over again in a more environmental and sustainable way though even there we are far from perfect always learning and growing doing better as we know better.
This little homestead farm is a magical place named for the New England wildflowers that grow all around. A place where a physicist, watches the night sky on clear nights with the aide of mirror and glass, and a woman, works endlessly in the gardens, the kitchen, and a variety of projects to create and to keep a very unique life style running and functioning. Wildflower Farm, has become so much more than simply a piece of land we can grow a few vegetables on. The longer I spend here, the more alive the land seems, the more I learn about it's function and the more meaning it has. My place in the universe and the next steps on our new path become ever more clear.
We welcome you on this journey with us.
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