FRESH FRUIT

 

Every year the old apple tree produces masses of cooking apples ... most of which end up covering the lawn. They don't go to waste though ...  I pick some up to enjoy apple pie or, better still apple crumble, and neighbours come round to take bags of them away ...

... some are feed to our other neighbours ...

... and the rest stay on the lawn to be fought over and devoured by the migrant visitors ...

Fieldfares and ...

Redwings.

In Autumn 2019 four people walked by the garden and I heard them commenting on the number of apples that had landed over the garden fence on the road verge.  One of the women bent to pick up a few so I shouted out to her to take as many as she liked and offered to get her a carrier bag! My freezer was full of sliced apples and we had cider bubbling away in demi-johns.

I invited her to come back over the next few weeks if she wanted more as the eating apples were not quite ready and we had plenty to spare!  

Unfortunately, I forgot to mention this to my husband!

A week or two later we went shopping and returned to find a strange couple wandering round picking the fruit! I recognised them but before I could explain to my husband he was asking them who they were!

 

The lady was quite mortified - she had knocked on the door and hadn't been sure about taking the fruit when we weren't in ... but I had said it was okay .... and a bottle of wine with a note were waiting for us on the step .... 

Everything was fine.  The wine was unnecessary as we were glad the fruit was going to be eaten and enjoyed ... we invited her to come back every year ...

... and she has done.  After four years we are like old friends! Pauline's husband brings me home-grown tomatoes and chillies and next year I get to taste some of her apple chutney.  

They took three lots of fruit away this time: the apples of course; some damsons for jam and some plums.  We had a HUGE crop of plums this year. I was gorging on them all day when I was gardening ... delicious! 

We ate what we could and gave loads away but there was still plenty left for the wasps and butterflies.

The taste of a plum straight from the tree is wonderful.  The greengage is particularly sweet so those don't tend to be given away... they are all mine! 

  I have to inspect the skin carefully before that first bite though ....

 "What is worse than finding a worm in a fruit you have just bitten into?"

"Finding half a worm!"

Luckily that hasn't happened to me!