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It’s The Most Wonderful Time of The Year – No I Don’t Mean Christmas

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Luke Fall Harvest Fruit Picker Picking Cider Apples Upper Peninsula Michigan
Picked Apples – Ready to be Pressed!

Marquette, MI – Before you turn into a Grinch because I even mentioned Christmas or implied Snow is around the corner, just hear me out.  Today marks the official start of Fall, and with it Apple Cider Time!

Fall is definitely my favorite time of the year.  I don’t care for hot Summer days, and hate sticky Summer nights.  You can keep your Spring with all it’s rain, and forget about the muddy, dirty mess.  While I do enjoy snow and the Winter cold (crazy I know), Autumn is where it’s at!

Luke Fall Harvest Fruit Picker Picking Cider Apples Upper Peninsula Michigan 12
My New Apple Picker

I love working outside in the fall, when it’s in the low 60’s or 50’s.  I love needing to wear a flannel or plaid shirt to fend off getting chilled.  I love the food, the hearty chili my wife cooks up, her stews, roasts and the warmth that can only be felt by once again firing up our wood stove. Fall brings us the harvest from our gardens, reaping the benefits of a summer’s worth of work.

But hands down my favorite things to do in the fall is pick apples for our cider press and eat them until I almost feel sick.  This year I’ve stepped up my apple picking game with some new pole fruit pickers!  Last year I climbed the trees and threw the apples down into the truck.  If they’re being used for cider it’s okay to bruise them a little ;-)  However my wife didn’t like me up in the tree as much as I had to be.

So, this year I want to be able to pick more fruit from the ground, saving the climb for the tallest trees and the highest apples.  This also lets my helpers pick while I’m doing the aerial dance to get the tree tops picked over.

While you can’t beat Fresh Cider, we usually save a little to ferment into Hard Cider too!  The fresh cider can be frozen and tastes great anytime throughout the winter.  The hard cider, takes about 3 months to complete and tastes great as well.  I’ll do another post when I get picking this year, right now the apples aren’t quite ready so enjoy my pictures from last year.

Let me know if you’ve ever pressed cider and we can swap stories and recipes about the best blend.

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