This is a grape vine that long ago escaped its trellis and established itself on the garden fence. It was picked this week along with all its neighbors (60 row feet of vines). I'd guess we got 100 pounds.
Nice looking fruit, too:
No, I sadly don't know the varieties, but mostly they are seedless cultivars good for both table and wine. We of course choose the wine route, and pressed the grapes that day, resulting 5 1/2 gallons of juice, now fermenting.
Another welcome first harvest was a "Halona" muskmelon that had "slipped from the vine." At least that's what The Kitchen Goddess said when she brought it in. I have my doubts about that. It was about 95% ripe I'd say, but still very tasty.
Another first, our one pear! Normally we get about 30, but this year was challenging for tree-fruits.
Another first, a watermelon radish, shown with a wax bean for scale:
TKG added it to a small batch of kimchee she made with some Chinese cabbage recently picked.
Some other representative harvests this week:
Then, sadly, some definite last harvests. This corn was undersized and poorly pollinated, and the artichokes are tiny even by our standards, but we had them together for one last meal, and they were wonderful!
And we took all the rest of the spring-sown beets, if you can believe they've been in the ground that long. But they weren't too bad-looking!
That's it for this week. Thanks for reading, and as always, thanks to Dave at Our Happy Acres for hosting Harvest Monday.
Don't often see that many firsts together with that many lasts - those grapes look lovely! I also particularly like the first of your "representative harvest" photos - now that's a summer harvest!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Margaret. TKG wants all the world to know she did the arranging in that photo.
ReplyDeleteWow on all those grapes! I can imagine how much effort it took to make the juice. Do you have a large press? Looks like TKG could work as a food stylist for sure!
ReplyDeleteWell, she certainly styles our meals with a flair! We have a small press, and have decided to upgrade to something more robust with hopefully less effort!
DeleteThat's an impressive grape harvest! I don't know if I would have the patience to wait for wine- I'd want to gobble them up!
ReplyDeleteMost of the grapes certainly were table quality. We ate a few, but decided to put the bulk into the press. It's how we preserve grapes!
DeleteI too am impressed with your grape harvest. You at least got one pear, I got zero this year because of the weather, next year got to be better.
ReplyDeleteThe grapes are really beautiful and they sure seem to be productive. It's hard to believe that the beets were in the ground so long, they would have been rough and scaley if they sat in my garden that long. So sad to see the last of the corn already.
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