Apples, apples, and even more apples....

One of my favorite things about the autumn season is fresh, crisp apples from the local orchards. In the past week alone, we've bought about 42 pounds of apples....which sounds like (and is!) a lot. Possibly the only place with more apples than we currently have is an orchard itself! Here's a shot of our crisper drawer in the refrigerator.


Notice how the spill onto the other shevles as well. (And this is only HALF of them!)


When sour cherries were in season, we tried our hand for the first time at drying fruit. The end result turned out pretty well. We got this old dehydrator from my parents, which had never been used, but also had no instructions. The dehydrator itself is pretty straightforward. There are no buttons or knobs and no way to adjust anything really. Essentially you just plug the cord in and let it go.


With that said, I've been relying on different websites I come across with hints and information about the process. The amount of time it takes is a little tricky because there's really nothing to go by. The cherries took about 8 hours to finish completely. The apples took much longer. Much, much, MUCH longer...... Here's two shots of them in the dehydrator dying away.






In the end, it took 18 for the first batch to be done and over 24 hours for our second batch to be finished. This of course also involved getting up multiple times in the middle of the night to check on their progress. The final result was wonderful, but it just took a little longer than expected. Needless to say I'll be making a lot of crisps/cobblers and desserts in the upcoming days!

I also just updated our Etsy shop with three new items. A few new things will also be added sometime tomorrow. Happy Thursday!

~Beth