Crazy fruit memory

So there I was reading on of my favourite blogs, Starving off the Land, when I had a flashback to my own moment of canning craziness. One so crazy I thought I’d tell you all about it. And by “you all” I mean “you three” but still, three is enough for all, yes?

Anyway. Crazy story. This isn’t about the eight day peach preserving effort (which is eight days of repeated labour, not one day or work and seven of waiting) crazy though that is. This is about the things we do for love. Crazy fruit things.

Back in the years of being married we’d make a trip every fall to Creston, in BC. Cranbrook first to visit family, then to Creston to load up the van with fruit. Peaches, apricots, plums…whatever was looking good. I’d take two extra days vacation leave and from the minute we got back until midnight or so on the second night I’d can fruit. Made a bit of jam but since I resent paying for fruit to jam and/or jell, I mostly just canned fruit to see us through the winter. It usually lasted until sometime in early March. Now perhaps where you live that is the end of winter, but here there often isn’t even a hint of spring on March first. Inevitably we’d have to resort to buying canned fruit.

One year – the crazy year – I thought about what my then significant other chose to buy when we ran out of home canned fruit. And I discovered that it was always the same thing: fruit salad. Being, well, crazy, I decided that I would make my own fruit salad and can it.

I peeled and chopped the pears, the peaches, the pineapple. I pitted the cherries and God help me I pricked each and every grape with a needle so they would keep their shape. Never again. Not for love, but I suppose perhaps for money. Don’t get me wrong, it worked, it was delicious. But it took AGES to make, and about three large spoonfuls to eat, which he mainly did standing in front of the fridge deciding what to have for breakfast. So much effort for what disappeared in a couple of weeks. Not worth the effort. Not even if it made me a millionaire.

Perhaps if it made me a multi-millionaire. I think my cut off would be two million. Pay me two million dollars and I’ll can ONE BATCH of fruit salad for you. Just one. Because two million would come in useful and I think I could get through the work thinking about the money. I think. Maybe.