Seasonal food- Apples

Apples are an abundant autumnal seasonal food, some varieties can be grown throughout different times of year but for the majority of varieties, the fruit is harvested in Autumn.

One way of ensuring your abundance doesn't get wasted is to first protect the crop from birds and insect pests like coddling moth, and once harvested, to use safe food preservation methods, such as dehydrating.

Julie recently shared these photos, dehydrating the beautiful Red love Apples.

Dehydrating apples is simple, Julie's photos show how she uses a manual apple peeling and slicing tool to get the job done quickly.

Nothing has to go to waste either, finding ways to get the most out of your crops is not only good for your budget and health but is a great way to prevent waste.

Turn your apple cores into pectin for jam making which you can freeze for future jam cooking days, or add them to the peels and make a jar of apple cider vinegar.

If you still have more than you'd need for all of that, the skins and cores can be put into your compost and turned into soil food.

If you have a very large amount, depending on the variety you could make cider, or sweet apple juice with no added sugar by the safe food preservation method of pasteurisation. Remember that preserving is a food science and the regulations should be followed for safety.

There are so many ways that you can use apples and they provide a great source of dietary fibre.

It's Autumn, and a great time to plant bare root fruit trees, so why not source a local bare root apple tree of a variety you like, and plan for more future delicious abundance too!