photograph by Judith Hausman
I canned my foraged “ parking lot ” pears in rummy with plums and ground cherry .
It ’s a rainy , showery Clarence Shepard Day Jr. , and a rain we sorely ask here in the Hudson Valley . Despite the rainfall , I had to go get the Cydonia oblonga today , or else I ’d have been too late for them .
About three year ago , I attain the little orchard that my friend ’s pappa had plant and since have been given permission to raid it for Cydonia oblonga every drop . The bumpy , beautiful fruit is rock - firmly and wormy but with patience and trimming , I make deep - rosemembrillo(quince spread ) , the traditional Latino co-occurrence to cheese . I ’ve cope a knock - out quincetarte Tatin , too , by first gently cooking the fruit in butter and red wine .
Anyway , rain or not , it was sentence . It ’s my own private tradition to honor the H.M.S. Bounty that these neglected trees still produce in good faith , even if no one cares for them or eat their endearing fruit .
Except there were no quince .
rather , I get another humbling lesson in seasonality . Some year , there are Cydonia oblonga , and some years in the cycle of the trees , it ’s so dry out the quince do n’t make it . The small orchard , bounded with Edward Durell Stone walls and a suburban elementary school , was quiet , breezy and soused , but the trees had no yield at all .
I still acquire to perform my ritual , though . The orchard also hold two kinds of apple trees , and I was able to pick about a half - bushel of the lusterlessness , tan , web - skinned smorgasbord . Even with judicious clipping , there will be enough of the ironical , tart flesh to make smooth , brown Malus pumila butter without sugar . And I gather several branches of elderberry clusters from young bushes growing under the trees . They make a neat combination with apples . Rather than humble pie , I ’ll spread humble Malus pumila - European elder butter on my pledge and give it for gifts along with a wooden spreader and a batch of homemade muffins . Next twelvemonth , there will ( probably ) be quince again .
In contrast to these trees , the parking lot pear tree I cabbage every year has been swag with small-scale , green - white-livered pears . They can be intemperate and a lilliputian wormy , but I had the patience to get them ripen to sweet softness on the tree a little longer this twelvemonth . I have already put up two jolt of quarter Pyrus communis in brandy , star anise and pep and three more jar of slice Pyrus communis , layered with prune plum and dry land cherries , in rummy , cinnamon and salvia leave . I ’m going to try a batch with vanilla noggin and rosemary , too .
I filled clean jars with the switch off fruit and the seasonings , scatter each stratum liberally with wampum , carefully pour in the liquor , and then closed the jarful . This has got to be the easiest agency there is to enamour the local fruit crop and , boy , oh boy , will those jolt make telling gifts .
I may box the pears with a pear candle or a funky , vintage serve spoonful . Therumtopf(rum - inebriate fruit ) partners well with a little lemon pound cake or maize shortbread cookies and a few tiny aperitif glasses . Of course , good vanilla extract ice cream is the reliable and luxurious default accompaniment for any “ bibulous ” fruit , not just my deary : the foraged bagsful from forget Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree .
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