SERIES: Gathering vs. Buying – apples, plums, pears

In a previous post on blackberries, I covered the idea of gathering versus buying.  Nature and community (friends, acquaintances, neighbors, etc.) can provide opportunities for free wild & whole food.  As good managers of our homes, we should absolutely take advantage of these opportunities!  I know that it’s not for everyone, and doing something with the food that you gather requires time and effort.  Not everyone has the time or desire to put the effort here.  That’s ok.

If it is something that interests you, keep your eyes and ears open for the opportunities.  Everyone (at least in the Pacific Northwest) can pick blackberries.  They’re everywhere in the summer and you don’t need any special permission to pick them. Have at it!

Other opportunities we’ve found range from signs on the side of the road reading, “free plums.”  We stopped in, picked plums from a sweet older couples’ trees filling grocery bags with ripened purple plums.  We also have a connection to apple and pear orchards in central Washington where we can pick fruit in September.  There’s nothing quite like an apple picked and eaten fresh from this year’s crop.  Most of the apples we buy in the grocery stores are from the prior September and have been held over in cold storage.  The crispness and juiciness of a fresh apple is one of life’s many pleasures that everyone should experience in the Fall.

I dehydrated the plums, turning them into prunes, and use them in braises to add sweetness to chicken or beef.  I also made a jar of savory plum jam that had rosemary and balsamic in it – something that paired nicely with cheese.

We eat the apples as snacks, but I’ll make applesauce with the varieties that don’t hold over well.  This is the first year that we got a load of pears and I’m looking forward to making pear butter with them.  Lots of ideas and endless opportunities to enjoy the harvest of this season.