shakin' down the apples!

Today Mystery Guest and I went off on an adventure with Nature et Decouvertes (basically the French version of the Nature Company). They organize trips of all different sorts during the year. You join their club (cheaper than I had expected, only 6e a year) and then you can take trips with them for a very reasonable price.

We signed up a couple weeks ago to "discover apples". Meeting point, in front of the town hall in Livarot (about 45 minutes from Caen) in the middle of the pays d'auge, the heart of apple country.

After meeting we drove out to a little farm owned by a retired couple and the non-profit organization which runs it. They often hold "animations" for school children about how farms work, the bugs and critters in the little stream and how to respect the environment.

Today was all about the apples!












First was a walk in the rain out to the apple orchards where we took a long hooked stick and shook the trees to knock down the apples. The guide explained all the different techniques as well the local environment. I learned a whole bunch of new words but the only one I remember is woodpecker :-)












Then we gathered all the apples up and took them back to the house where we washed cut them up. First step was making apple jelly. The woman running the kitchen had already cooked up some apples so we put them in the hand-held press wrapped in a rag and squeezed the juice and pectin out. This juice was then combined with the same weight of sugar (2.4 kilos juice/2.4 kilos sugar) and boiled to make the jelly.

Then we made apple juice with the apples we had gathered. First the entire apple (stem, seeds, worms and all!) were grated and then everything squeezed in the same press. We had a basketfull of apples which gave us 1.5 liters of juice.

When all was said and done we had a little snack, apple pie and our juice of course! It was delish! I had never had freshly squeezed apple juice before and it is so good, nothing added, just pure juice. I was surprised at how dark and cloudy the juice was.

Just before leaving we got little jars of apple jelly to take home :-)

It was a wonderful afternoon! I had always wanted to go visit the apple farms during the fall to see the harvest and how things were done :-) And all that for only 5euros, not bad! Thanks Nature et Decouvertes and of course Mr. Mystery Guest!