Apple Peel Jelly and Wood Fire

We lit our wood stove for the first time yesterday. The temperature inside was 62 F, so quite bearable, but we wanted to cure the stove while we could still open the windows, and get the hang of lighting a fire before the cold really kicks in. Going by this evening’s attempts, we’ll have to do a better job of sorting our wood, and splitting it a little more. Even after a year out there, some logs are still not dry enough.

I processed most of my half bushel of apples into unsweetened apple sauce. For some reason – because the canning book says “peel” and I am still such a novice that I feel I have to follow each instruction to the letter – I peeled the apples before boiling them. (Next time, no more, and that will save me a lot of time).

So that left me with a big mound of apple peels. Thinking of the vegetable stock I made earlier with peels and trimmings, I wondered if there was a “fruit stock” I could make with these peels.

I didn’t find anything like fruit stock, but I found an apple peel jelly recipe, over at the Backwoods Home Magazine – the irreverent jokes in which I enjoy a lot. I called up the orchard from which I bought the apples and they assured me their apples are pesticide free. So I stuck ’em in a pot (two pots actually, there was so much of it), boiled them with water for 15 minutes, and set them aside for a night. Tomorrow I’ll finish and can them.

I was thinking I never used to be so frugal with food. I used to prepare and eat my food without thinking much about it. Even after starting the garden, I never thought of what I was doing as frugal. More like taking control of our food supply, shrinking our ecological footprint, re-learning skills that might be needed in the future, etc.

Making jelly out of apple peels, though, that counts as frugal. I’m very curious to try the result.