Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Apple Cider'ish Jelly

Rhiannon loves apples.  I'd bet she eats at least one every day.  Since we go through so many apples, the chickens get a lot of apple cores.  And even though I feel giving the "waste" to our chickens isn't a waste at all, I still felt like I should somehow utilize those cores for something other than chicken snacks.

Then I read someplace that you can save the cores and skins in the freezer until you have enough to make jelly with them (now why didn't I think of that???).  So since before the beginning of Summer, I've been cutting up Rhiannon's apples for her so I could put the un-chewed and un-toddler-slobbered cores in a bag in the freezer.

This weekend I figured I had enough for making a decent batch of jelly:

I cooked the apple cores down with some water and was thinking I'd just make apple jelly.  But the smell reminded me of apple cider, so I threw in some cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg and cloves to make it more "festive".  After everything cooked for a while, I strained and smooshed the apple "stew" through a fine sieve then strained it through several milk filters into jars:
Almost a gallon of apple cider'ish juice.
It was getting late so I just put the jars into the fridge and would make jelly the following day.  The remaining apple pulp went to the very grateful chickens.  And you though I just screwed my biddies out of their apple snacks.  Now they had apple cider snacks.

The next day I took the apple cider'ish juice out of the fridge and started the jelly making process.

The end result:
This is what you get when your toddler "helps" you set up what
was supposed to be a professional looking shot of the cider jelly.
Heavenly Autumn smelling apple cider jelly!  (No dinosaurs were harmed in the making of this jelly.)

I think we're up to over twenty-nine pints and twenty-two 1/2 pints of blackberry, grape, and apple cider jam/jelly in the pantry.  Guess we're set for PB&J's for at least a year now!

8 comments:

  1. Could you post the recipe you used for this?? I have been trying to find an apple jelly recipe that is actually good...

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  2. Yep, I was going to make cider jelly... I even bought a half gallon of cider. Which I drank. So, unless I decide to you what you did for next year, or scare up some more cider... Guess I won't get apple jelly. Oh, well... :)

    Cat

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  3. By the looks of the news you may need to plant peanuts next year to make Peanut Butter to go with your jelly. Recall on Peanut Butter and peanut products, makes you wonder really how safe food supply is.

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  4. Oh yes, lease with the recipe? None of the fruit trees here in town produced anything this year. Between the late frosts and the heavy winds, the season was a flop. I want to go down to the local grocer in town and hit their discount basket in the veggie section, and this sounds like a perfect excuse to do it. And by the way, I love the dinosaurs, and that you put the pic up with daughter's helping you out. Made me smile this morning.

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  5. It looks wonderful! I love making (and eating) jelly. I make apple jelly from the peelings and cores too. I like to add come real cider to make it more apple tasting.

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  6. Since your cider'ish jelly is dinosaur approved, I vote for you sharing the recipe too! :)

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