the grapes of sweetness

I've tried something new today, which I have heard/learned a lot about, but have not tried. I juiced my very first basket of grapes, and what a success it was!! After steaming down an 11 quart basket of concord grapes, I now have 6 1/4 quarts of fresh, yummy, all-natural, no-preservative grape juice---I consider it more a grape concentrate though, becuase it is quite syrup like, and sweet.

Here's what I did:

I started out with one 11 quart basket of freshly picked concord grapes. As this was a first trial, I started small, but I do know of people that do up to 12 bushels of grapes, equaling roughly 50 gallons of syrup---love a duck that's a lot of grape juice!

Next, I hulled the grapes from the vine, and washed them thoroughly. (Note: this is only half the grapes)

Water is added to the steamer, and the grapes placed into the collinder insert. I added the second half of the grapes, once the grapes started to steam down, and juice was being produced.

This is the set up suggested to me to catch the juice. I transferred the juice into half-quart mason jars and sealed the lids---which sealed quite well on their own, because the juice is boiling hot, however, I did boil the jars just to make sure the lids sealed properly.

Here is the finished product---after about a 1/2 hour of prep ,1 and 1/2 hours of steaming and 15 minutes of cleaning, you've got some delicious, all-natural, anti-oxidant rich grape juice at your convience.

There you go! Oh, I though I would mention---once I find away to seperate the seeds from the peels, I plan on using the pulp to make a batch of fruit leather---waste not, want not!

one happy lady

I am one happy lady---I was able to have another exceptionally productive day! What made my day all that more wonderful is that I spent the majority of it in my kitchen--- My little piece of heaven on earth.

My day was comprised of:

Only the most delicious ginger bread cookies, suggested to me by Andrea over at Sgtand MrsHub.

Two full casserole dishes, of whole wheat pasta cassorole---it's like lasagna, but I used penne instead of lasagna noodles. There was one for me to freeze and one for a young mother at our church, who has pneumonia.

Note: This hasn't been cooked yet, because I'm freezing it for a quick and healthy dinner when I don't have time!

The rest of my productivity is still in the oven and the breadmaker---roastbeef, and while wheat flax bread. Yummy, I can't wait for dinner!

Oh, and the laundry, mustn't forget about the loads of laundry. I think by the end of today I just might be caught up!

I'll catch you all later, thanks for stopping by:)

Ps: Grab your hiking boots, we're going on an adventure---in my next post!