Apples, start to finish

For the first time since leaving our house in Oregon (where we had mature pear and apple trees), I harvested apples from our own fruit trees.

The apples were neither large nor abundant, but not bad for a first crop.

Despite the trees' youth, most of the fruit was still above my reach. At my height, this isn't uncommon. The fruit-picking basket came in handy.

I only got nine pounds, but hey, it's a start.

Since we didn't have any more apple pie filling in the pantry, I decided to turn the whole batch into pie filling.

I used fruit pie filling directions I got years ago from the county extension service.

Blanching the apple slices.

Starting the filling.

The filling, thickened.

Adding the blanched apples to the filling.

As usual, on days I have kitchen projects, I have the remarkable skill of dirtying every dish in the kitchen.

Seems like a lot of work for just five quarts of pie filling. But it's pie filling from our own apples -- and that's a thrill!