[Sca-cooks] Growing for Feast

[Laura C. Minnick]

At 09:16 AM 4/19/2005, you wrote:


>This is the part that will make you crazy.  Our ancient ancestors didn't 
>have to deal with kingdom calendar scheduling a year in advance.  They 
>could hold a harvest festival whenever the harvest actually happened.  I 
>timed a cooking contest, whose theme ingredient was "plums" to the usual 
>date when my parents' trees were usually at their peak harvest.  Then we 
>had a hot snap in the late spring and the damn things ripened a month 
>early.  Aieeeee!

Definitely can't count on Mother Nature, eh?

The plum tree right outside my window was so heavy with fruit last year 
that we were concerned about damage to the limbs. I don't remember how many 
gallons of plums we picked- it was a LOT. Morwyn brought her orchard ladder 
over and we stripped the tree. She took a bunch home with her, and my 
student Larry and I spent several hours just pitting plums, not to mention 
the next couple of days worth of jam, sauce, etc (BTW- the 'Erbowle'- ISTR 
from _Two-15th C_- is terrifically easy to put up, and is delightful on 
just about anything).

This year? Maybe a dozen blooms. Good thing I put up so much last year!

'Lainie
___________________________________________________________________________
O it is excellent to have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous To use it 
like a giant--Shakespeare, Measure for Measure, Act II