Grape Abundance

Our family is either fortunate, or not so fortunate to have a concord grape vine growing along the backside of our property. This year’s crop was exceptional, and we couldn’t stand the thought of wasting even one little grape. In years past we’ve made jelly, juice, and even grape pies to freeze for the holidays. We wanted something different this year. After living here for over a decade we have an over abundance of grape jelly in the cupboard. Even the neighbors have had enough! So, my hubby found a recipe for fruit leather with a very short ingredient list, grapes, that’s it, nothing but fresh concord grapes. First you mash the grapes, removing the skins and seeds from the pulp. A kitchen gadget made just for such an endeavor made this part fairly painless. Next it called for cooking the juice and pulp down to a jam like consistency, which the author said would take a couple of hours, give or take an hour, since it needed to be done on low. After nearly twelve hours of this, the grapes were finally the right consistency for the final step of cooking in the oven on low for two hours. What resulted was a really good grape fruit leather that most of the family likes. Will we do it again next year? Right now it looks like we might be vacationing in the south of France when the grapes are ready to harvest. Darn.G