Apple Wine and Green Tomato Chutney

I've been a busy little bee these last few days - it's autumn and there's plenty to be done to make sure that as-close-to-nothing-as-possible gets wasted from the harvest.


Our apple crop was laughably small this year, which nicely matches the fact that our apple tree is also laughably small (not to mention crowded into oblivion by other fruit trees that were planted far too close by Millbrooker Towers' previous incumbent).


The fruit wasn't over-tasty to eat straight from the bough either. So I sliced them all up, boiled them into something of a pulp, added water, sugar, yeast and some yeast nutrient.

And here's the crop in its current state.

Another few weeks and a second racking off should give us the better part of a couple of gallons of quaffable hooch with which to poison a fair portion of the social circle.


And then there was the tomato crop. Or, similarly, the lack of a tomato crop. Very few of the bloomin' things actually made it to full ripeness this year due largely to our choosing an unsuitable bit of garden to stick the plants into. Which left us with a pretty large quantity of small green spherical(ish) objects.


Some slicing and spicing later, and after several hours of gently simmering in vinegar...

...lots and lots of green tomato chutney. The whole house has a mildly pungent aroma about it at the moment courtesy of simmering spiced vinegar; not unpleasant, but almost all-pervasive.


I think I might have to stick the chutney recipe onto the MillbrookCookBook - the odd teaspoonful tasting that we've tried was definitely on the yummy side. Most of the jars will make it into the homespun Christmas hampers that we've taken to giving in lieu of proper (but costly) presents, but I think we'll have to keep a jar or two for ourselves.