Plenty of spring rains and now plenty of sun has the central TX wild grapes right on schedule.
The chubby sun burned Perd compliments yesterday's
find.
Rain to heat ratio must have a big bearing on ripening grapes !
In the CenTex area it looks like almost half the crop is very close to full ripe.
Thats almost a full month earlier than last year.
Happy days for wineos !
Too many grapes, not enough flint. Here's nother pic, looks like a reworked Andice.
. . . . RH, , , , You are correct, , MUSCADINES ! I also thankyou for gettin me
going. . . I Googled WILD GRAPES OF TEXAS. Lots of good info and 14 other varieties of
wild grapes.
I was going to sit home today in the airconditioning watching the Michael Jackson funeral
arrangements. Then You made me figure, I better get out and check on the Muscadines ! And maybe a little digging.
Well the dig was excellent, bout 30 some worked pieces. Be it ever so humble, ANY complete Martindale is a treasure ! AND LOOKIT THE RIPE GRAPES!
Now more follow up on your input, RH. Were the ancients drinking the Vino ?
I rigged a field grape squozer, just a heavy plastic panel craftily tilted so the juice would run
to one corner and into a cup.
I learned how to properly stomp grapes in Italy Or was that France ?? Italy was the olive oil stomp ! ]
RH, my test was inconclusive, I was on the second cup then everything went black and I saw
fireworks, so I dont really know if I got a few of the poisonous MOONSEED grapes, or I couldnt handle the quick ferment !
For CENTX winos. . .Come this Tuesday night its all over til next year !
My days foragings [ NOT the flint ] . . .Is in the hands of LAUGHS WITH A FIST for more squeezing.
AAaaGHhhhh. . . BLACK TOE, I completely forgot you might be looking in !! I missed the oppurtunity
of the year !!!!!!!
I would have made a special effort to do some toe comparing. . . I damaged my big toe, right foot, years ago in a construction accident [ not near as interesting a story as yours ] and now the north end of the nail is permanently BLACK.
First chance I get again, I'll do a special closeup.
Must be something in Texas that needs stomping !
I dont usually post at this time of day, prefering early morn. But I'm making an exception today
cause I plan to give my full attention to the Michael Jackson memorial ceremonies that have already begun tonight ! !
The china ware cup was given to me by someone at last years Digfest. See if you can track down
source from the dot com on the cup.
I can hardly believe that it took me over 2 hours to harvest grapes in 100*+ temps, tromp around in the woods barefooted, nearly killing myself getting in the pic with only a 10 second timer , finding a
bucket of flint. . . . . .AND The drinking cup gets all the attention !!
thank you for the details on the cup.i went to the web site , and they cost 7.50. us dollars. sorry you went to all that trouble ,bare feet and all.i did enjoy your pictures,alas the cup is a big hit.thank you hal.
Can you see all those beautiful and plentiful ripe wild grapes ? Thats why I'm a digger and not a farmer !
I thought they were on the way out 3 weeks ago but here they are right on the same schedule as last year.
Last week of July [ in CenTx ]
Picked all I could carry and turned them over to "Laughts with a fist "
who hopefully will process them properly !
There's never a complete huge Andice in sight just when you need one for a
grape report, sorry just had to use a pendant !
FIRST THE GOOD NEWS. . .
This is the end of line [ or end of the vine ]
Mlle kindly processed the wild grapes into grape jam
[ jelly ]
This was my actual late lunch on 8/10.
AAAAaahhh
Here's Badgers [ saka "laughs with a fist" ] lunch with the grapes !
Here's some tech notes: : : :
For the realistic connections to how the ancients ate their jam, that blade is 8 3/4 inches long and worked well [ except for slicing the bread cleanly ! ]
Thats real milk in the one eyed Jack cup. . .I finished every drop !
Notice I prefer my PB & J WITHOUT a lid and on white bread toast.
Checkout bite radii, Quint would be happy !
The grape was slighty "tart" [ sour ] but very good as it stayed down.
Bottom line advice for those interested in processing next year's crop.. . . Buy the Welshes, seedless Concord grape Jelly.