Grapes - Jelly & Juice

3 years ago I planted a grape vine that I purchased at, of all places, Aldi. 3 years ago is when we had that super dry summer here in Illinois, and I must admit, I forgot to water this new plant pretty much the whole summer. I though it had died... It did not however, and the next year - last year, it looked pretty good, and grew quite a bit but had no fruit. I researched what to do with it and how to keep it under control and producing grapes, and this is what I learned.

Concord Grapes

The first year you don't do anything to it, same for the second year. The third year, however, you prune it. Ether in the fall or the early spring. The goal is to get it down to one main vine, and cut off everything else. Mine however seemed to split, and I had 2 main vines, I couldn't decide which one was more worthy of living, so I kept them both....  They grew, HUGE, the whole side of the porch (not over running it, but close) And, as predicted, I got grapes! about 350+ of them actually. At first I though they were concord grapes, but my friends from down the street have a friend who has LOTS of grapes, too many grapes, and they gave me 5lbs of them to make Jelly (will go over that later) After tasting the concord grapes, I realized that my grapes were not concord grapes, I don't know what they are, but they are purple, and have about 2-4 seeds in each, they are a little sour, but not too bad anymore.

I read that once they turn purple you wait 1-3 weeks to harvest them. It's all about the way they feel (not too squishie, but not too hard) the way they taste (not too sour) and the way they feel in your mouth (I got lost on this one, they felt the same to me every time I tried them) Anyhow, I picked them because I saw a couple of them shriveling up... And then they sat in the fridge for a while while I decided what to do with them. I liked eating them, but they had so many seeds I didn't really think I would eat all 350+ of them... So they sat till my neighbor brought over the concord grapes for jelly.

The Jelly making process seemed really rough when I read through the instructions, but with a little help from my neighbor (he did most of it) it seemed pretty easy... Pretty much 3 steps.

Jars being cleaned

Step one: boil the jars and tops you plan to use and leave them in the water.

squished grapes

Step two: Make grape juice. You do this by taking all the grapes off the stems and then squishing them in a pan while the heat is on. Leave the heat on till they look pretty liquidie, then add 1.5 cups of water and squish some more.

Then you pour the substance in a jelly bag (cheese cloth bag basically) and squeeze all the juice out, then throw away the skins.

 

After that see how many cups you have, I had 3.5 cups, and I needed 5, so I added 1.5 cups.

SUGAR LOTS OF SUGAR

Step 3: make Jelly. Bring juice to a boil and add Sure Gel (I got mine at walmart - it was by the jello) THEN you mix it in and boil it for 10 minutes... Then you add all your sugar (7 cups!! YIKES) bring it to a boil and boil for ONE minute.

JELLY!

While you are waiting for it to boil grab the jars and lids out of the boiling water...Leave the heat on the stove though, you will need the water again.  After it boils you put it in the jars and put the lids on, once you clean off any jelly from the edges.., then you put the jars back into the water for 7 minutes, remove from the boiling water, and your lids should pop sealing them till you are ready to use them. One of mine did not pop - I think I did not clean the edges off well enough - guess I better start eating PB&J's.


Anyway, that was my Jelly experience, it was fun, I would do it again, and I can do it, you can too - it's really not that hard.

My 350 Grapes 

my 350 grapes.... hmmm

As for my 350ish grapes... I made juice out of them... I plan to make "sour grape martini's" out of them next weekend prehaps... maybe tonight... anything could happen.

Here are some detailed instructions to make your own Jelly. How To Make Jelly