Early November 2022| Practical Self Reliance
Late Fall Gardening, Foraging & Preserving
We’re well over a month past first frost here in November, but still eating plenty of fresh food from the land. A well planned out garden (and lots of perennial fruit) means we’re still well fed at home.
This week I have a bunch of special recipes working with those seasonal fruits for subscribers, as a special thank you for your support.
Cranberries are starting to ripen, and just a few days ago I shared my favorite cranberry canning recipes with y’all. Those are fruits that most people associate with this time of year, but they’re really just the beginning.
Autumn raspberries (also known as primocane raspberries) bear fruit this time of year on first year canes. (Summer raspeberries bear fruit on 2nd year canes that have overwintered.)
Often they’d have stopped in October, but this year the weather is just right, and even though we’ve had a few frosts there’s still enough warm days to ripen up raspberries in November.
Often we’d also have a few everbearing strawberries, which produce many more than the traditional “June bearing” varieites. They put out a normal crop in June, and then take a break in the summer’s heat, but start up again once things turn cool.
They’ll often put out fruit until they’re covered with snow, but this year they’re taking the autumn off. Can’t have it all I suppose!
Our alpine strawberries are filling in the gap. They produced the heaviest during the summer heat, and they’re still putting out enough fruit to harvest a few handfuls a day even this late in the season.
These flavorful little jewels make some of the very best jam and ice cream, and I’m hoping to save up enough handfuls for one more batch of ice cream.
For a batch, you’ll want 2 cups fruit, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 pint heavy cream and 1 cup milk. Macerate the fruit overnight in the sugar, then thrown everything into an ice cream maker until frozen. This recipe also works wonderfully with fresh raspberries. Use more sugar if your fruit are tart or you like your ice cream sweeter, around 3/4 cup.
These, however, are not the traditional “Early November” harvests we plan for each year, they’re just a nice bonus.
This time of year is usually dominated by Highbush Cranberry, Nannyberry, Aronia, Autumn Olive and all manner of wild foraged nuts. All of those are still out there for the taking, and they are dependably available all of Novmber every year.
I talked a few weeks ago about harvesting autumn olives on a hillside in Vermont, and they’ve now been turned into a truly delicious autumn olive jam. It tastes like cranberry apple jam, but with something more that I can’t put my finger on. Truly a one of a kind flavor.
To make a “batch” you’d need about 3 lbs of autumn olives, or roughly 9 cups fruit. Bring the fruit to a boil with a bit of water, then process it though a food mill. You should have about 4-5 cups pulp removed from the seeds. Add in 2 cups sugar and a box of sure jel low sugar pectin and you’ll have about 4-5 jars of delicious jam.
Aronia is still out there too, and it makes a delicious jelly and wine. The fruit have natural tannin and acidity, and all they need is a bit of sugar to make a spectacular wine.
The jelly has more of an “adult” flavor given the astringency, but it’s delicous on toast none the less.
If you want to make jelly, you’ll need 4 cups extracted juice, via steam juicer or jelly bag, 4 cups sugar and a box of sure jel pectin to make 5-6 jars.
For the wine, you’ll want about 6-8 cups juice, 2 1/2 pounds of sugar, 1 tsp yeast nutrient, wine yeast and water to fill to make a gallon. No tannin, acid or pectic enzyme required for this one.
A few weeks back I talked about husk cherries (also known as ground cherries), which have a tropical flavor and keep all winter in the husk.
Many of you asked for the recipe for Husk Cherry wine that we’re making this year, and I’m still futzing with that one. I’ll be adding things to balance out the flavor as needed as it progresses, but it’s already really deliciously tropical.
Thus far, for 1 gallon, I’ve used:
3 lbs husk cherries
2 lbs sugar
1 tsp Yeast Nutrient
1/2 tsp Pectic Enzyme
I may (or may not) add tannin based on how it tastes later, we’ll see. Right now the aroma is divine.
As we finish off putting up the fruit of the season, I’m going to be switching modes shortly into meat preservation. I already have quite a few charcuterie recipes up on the site, including beef bacon, cured pork loin (lonzino), pancetta and duck breast prosciutto.
I’m hoping to add a few more this year, namely regular pork bacon, lamb bacon, and a bunch more beef cures like bresaola.
Let me know if there’s anything you’re just dying to make and I’ll see if I can work up a recipe for you.
What are you harvesting, preserving, building or exploring on your homestead this week? I’d love to hear about it!
Leave me a note in the comments…
(Comments only, please. Emails tend to get lost in my inbox, and as much as I’d love to get back to each and everyone, my screen time is very limited…and things fall through the cracks, and emails get buried in my inbox. If you comment here, they’re all in one place, and it’s much easier to get back to every single one.)
Until Next Time,
Ashley at Practical Self Reliance
When I make autumn olive jam, I add a bit of cinnamon. The jam tastes like Thanksgiving and Christmas wrapped on one.
Disabled suburban apartment dweller. The only things I'm able to harvest are a couple of potted herbs, and Sea Grape and Cocoplum, and fish. My next "build" project is (yet another) cat door. :-) I finally almost nearly tamed a feral after 5+ years and she's just gotten comfortable enough to nap at my feet. So the bedroom door gets...a smaller bedroom door. AND a fresh coat of paint, to hide the many scuffs from my wheelchair.