The Homestead Way of Life

The Signs of Autumn

Wow - can you believe it's already October?  It truly seems like yesterday I was putting in the garden and praying for the summer harvest to come.  And, it surely did!  We were abundantly blessed with green beans, tomatoes, spinach, peas - glory to God - what a wonderful gardening season this was.  Now, as I look out over our acreage I can see the corn stalks beginning to brown, the green beans are putting out the last few precious flowers and the orange of my pie pumpkins stand out against the dying vines.  The evening air is crisp, my hens are moulting - all the signs that we are well into autumn.

But, I love this changing of the seasons.  I turn my eyes from the outdoor activities to the warmth of home.  I am planning on my first quilting project over the coming months.  A simple rag quilt inspired by one of my NHH readers.  We must decide on what we will be making for Christmas gifts and get started on that.  The kids are looking forward to the first rainy days so they can have hot chocolate in the morning before they begin their schoolwork.  Our apple trees didn't fare so well this year - it seems like each year one type of fruit tree just "takes the year off" and this year it was the apples.  However, my July bearing Lodi produced loads of apples, most of which I sliced and froze for winter pies.  Here is my favorite apple pie recipe (it came in 5th out of 13 entries in our local apple pie contest one year!):

Lisa's Apple Pie

One pie crust (recipe follows)

8 cups sliced apples (Lodi, Granny Smith, Golden Delicious, etc.)

1/4 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg

1/3 to 1/2 cup light honey

Salt

Mix together flour, cinnamon and nutmeg in a large bowl.  Add sliced apples and toss until apples are coated with flour mixture.  Put apple mixture into crust.  Drizzle honey over the apples and shake a little salt over all.

Crumb topping:

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup cold butter (1 stick) cut into chunks

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

Process above ingredients together in a food processor (or blend with pastry blender) until crumbly.  Sprinkle over the top of pie apple mixture.  Bake 45 to 50 minutes.  If crumb topping starts to brown too much, cover it with foil during the last 10 or 20 minutes of baking.

Easy Pie Crust:

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp. salt

1/2 cup (1 stick) cold butter, cut into chunks

Put all ingredients into a food processor and begin to process.  Add 1 TBS. cold water at a time until the dough forms a ball on top of the processor blade.  Place dough on a lightly floured bread board and form into a ball.  Roll out.  Start from the middle and roll out into every direction, working clockwise, until you have a nice circle.  Roll dough up on to your roller and hold over greased pie plate.  Unroll over the pie plate, press in and trim.  Keep it in the fridge until you are ready to fill it.

Fall

09:13, 2007-Oct-1 .. Posted by smmagers

It is still summer over here. We are still in the high 80's. But it feels like fall at night there is a bite in the air. You are making me with my apple tree did not die. She gave us so any years of of fruit. I want to plant another but time will tell. God Bless. mj

Untitled Comment

08:56, 2007-Oct-2 .. Posted by Cindeerella

Hi Lisa! Glad to see you FINALLY posted!
I will definitely try this pie. Yum!
Cindee