If you were to look outside our windows this morning these are views you would see. It’s harvest time in our neck of the woods. In case you aren’t familiar with wine grape harvesting, they do it in the middle of the night when sugar and acid levels in the grapes are the most stable. It’s also much more favorable conditions for the work crew as temperatures can still get blazing hot during the day. It’s an exciting time around here, tractors and giant trucks carrying grapes are a constant on the road (usually right in front of you, going a third of the speed limit). Soon, maybe in another month the smell of fermenting grapes will hit you as you drive by wineries. This is a good time of year.

On our side of the fence line, we have our fair share of grapes, but not wine grapes. We have various types of table grapes growing. They faired much more productive than our poor Concord grapes so we decided to turn our excess into juice. Unlike with apple cider making, you don’t have to grind the grapes before you press them, which makes grape juice making much quicker. The hardest part was picking out the bad grapes from each bunch and making sure we had washed off all the spiders. Ick! But then we just loaded up the press and twisted and twisted and cranked that handle until we had pitchers of juice.

My initial intention was to can our excess juice, but it was too good, we drank it all right away. Maybe next year we’ll show more restraint and have it last longer. But for this year, we enjoyed every drop of that nectar.

As I said, this is a good time of year!