“Adding kidney beans to his cottage cheese and pineapple was an act of bravery Dave had not intended.”
We are blessed with another lovely day, sunny but cool.
In the Cape Times was an article about the cranberry. The article explained how the cranberry is one of only three native fruits, the others being the blueberry and the Concord grape. It is close to cranberry harvesting time which usually starts in late September. I have sometimes been lucky enough to happen upon a harvest, always a wet harvest. I love seeing those beautiful red fruits floating in the water. The color is extraordinary.
There are two kinds of harvests: the wet and the dry. In the water harvest, the bogs are flooded the night before. The next day a paddle boat of sorts churns the water. The berries are dislodged and float to the surface because they are hollow inside then they are gathered together and finally loaded onto trucks. The other sort is a dry harvest. A mechanical picker acts a bit like a lawnmower and combs the berries off the vine and deposits them in burlap bags hanging off the harvester. The best berries come from the dry harvest.
Once my brother, urged on by me, ate a red berry. It was poisonous and he had to have his stomach pumped. Now it makes me wonder who was the first to try cranberries or anything growing wild. I can imagine it now: the circle stands around the tribesman who volunteered. He takes a few berries, chews then swallows. The circle waits to see if he’ll survive. If he doesn’t, that’s one more berry crossed off the list. I’d watch the birds. I read it is safe to eat what they eat.
In Ghana I saw pineapples and bananas growing. I thought it was kind of neat to see them, not many chances around here. The pineapples surprised me. I figured their weight kept them close to the ground, but I was amazed to see them standing tall in the middle of a plant, one fruit to each plant. Bananas grow just like I imagined.
I like fresh cranberries and cranberry sauce from the can. I have made my own sauce but I have a warm spot for the canned sauce with the decorative rings. I love pineapples and bananas.
I would never volunteer to taste a berry.
Explore posts in the same categories: MusingsTags: bananas, cool day, cranberry, harvest, lovely day, pineapples, poisonous berries, sunny, wet and dry harvesting
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August 28, 2015 at 2:24 pm
You would soon die a horribly death if You followed the birds 🙂 🙂 🙂 They eat lots of berries we humans die of, like misteltoe berries for example. My mother always said that she ate what she saw cows eat whewn it came to berries and mushrooms, she too would soon die if she actually had followed that rule 🙂 🙂 🙂
Animals can eat lots of things we can’t and vice versa. But I have always wondered how they dared try new things to eat or drink, my guess is that they often tried it on slaves or captured enemies or most likely they had nothing else to eat 🙂
We have cranberries here too but I’m pretty sure most people here believes they are just bigger lingonberries. I doubt it would be even close to legal to flood a bog here but it did sound interesting. I did know how pine apples grow but then again I grew up in a family filled with gardeners 🙂 I was however surprised to learn that coconuts aren’t the brown hard thing we buy in our stores but big green things and the brown nut we buy is the big seed in the middle 🙂
We’ve had very mixed weather here today but fairly nice most of the time.
Have a great day!
Christer.
August 28, 2015 at 2:41 pm
Christer,
Okay, so I won’t follow the birds! I’ll just have to hope for the best!!
That’s a good guess, the slaves and enemies food tasters. The king always had a food taster in case he was being poisoned by an disloyal subject.
Flooding the bogs is a good thing especially for the winter. All the bogs are flooded from late December through mid- March to protect the vines and buds from winter injury. If it were illegal to flood the bogs in Sweden, you’d lose most if not all of them during the winter.
It is a great day today!!
Have a wonderful evening!
August 28, 2015 at 2:52 pm
Our bogs are of course always naturally wet but never intentionally flooded. Last winter was unusually wet but normal winters it’s possible to walk out there without sinking down especially much (before the ground freeze).
I’m glad You’ve decided not to follow the birds when it comes to berries 🙂
August 28, 2015 at 3:10 pm
Christer,
The owners want the water to freeze as it keeps the bogs from dying in the cold. The also sand the ice:
http://www.cranberries.org/cranberries/grow_icesanding.html
August 28, 2015 at 3:25 pm
That would never happen here. Too bad they sand the ice, would be perfect to try skating on 🙂
August 28, 2015 at 4:58 pm
Christer,
I would think if Sweden grew cranberries they would do it as part of the process.
Funny, I never thought about skating on the bogs.
August 28, 2015 at 7:14 pm
Greetings from wild blackberry country, a common weed here and delicious at this time of the year.
August 28, 2015 at 10:37 pm
Birgit,
I love ripe blackberries. They are so sweet.
August 28, 2015 at 11:05 pm
Hi Kat,
Testing strange food in a strange land was probably more “scientific”. You put a small amount in your mouth, chewed but did not swallow. Observe how you feel. Tingling in the mouth? Numbness? Nausea? Nothing? If nothing, swallow a tiny bit and observe how you feel. Have the prehistoric equivalent of Ipecac on hand. 🙂
Taste was an important clue. Sweet was probably always safe. Salty probably was too. Sour could go either way and Bitter was most likely unsafe but not always. If it smelled awful, it was probably not safe but then you get durian fruit which smells really awful but tastes incredibly good. Who was brave enough or hungry enough to test that one? They say early hominids were scavengers. Scavengers try everything. Like my dogs. Could be food, might be a toy.
Today was perfect. And I did not do housework. Well, laundry but that doesn’t count because it’s set it and forget it. It’s still down there in the dryer. 🙂
Enjoy the evening.
August 28, 2015 at 11:25 pm
Hi Caryn,
I figure some hungry survivors from a ship landed on an island and grabbed the first thing they saw which looked like food. Being scientific makes far more sense but probably being hungry trumps being cautious.
I would give kudos to anyone brave enough to taste something they’d never seen before.
It is even a bit chilly tonight. What a delightful feeling!
August 29, 2015 at 10:40 am
I also love the canned stuff. The two guys from the Ocean spray commercial has done wonders for the fruit.
I’m headed from Phoenix to New Jersey where it will be much nicer weather. The high yesterday here in the valley of the sun was 109F.
August 29, 2015 at 11:23 am
Bob,
When I was a kid, I wondered how my mother got the designs on the cranberry sauce.
I hop the weather we are having stays around for your visit.