Saturday Night Fever: Grape Jelly

With the “help” of five neighborhood boys (including three of my own) I gleaned my neighbor’s Concord grape vines today. By “help,” I mean that I looked over while teetering (one-footed sometimes) on a crappy old stepstool trying to reach the bunches that had grown into a pine tree—and noticed them all lounging in lawn chairs around the pool, looking at the alpacas in the back property. Thanks guys!

I kept things as simple as possible for my first foray into grape jelly making. I simmered the grapes in a big pot and tried my best to crush them as they were cooking. I was surprised at how much liquid was available after the initial heating step.

After straining all the liquid off, I was left with 5 cups of juice. Miraculously, the exact amount needed per the Sure-Gel recipe I was using. Sweet! This is the setup I needed to do the whole process. In the end, I only got around 8 cups of jelly, but it’s all I’ll be able to use in a year.

Late in the evening, one of the kids was chomping at the bit to use this homemade jelly for a PB&J sandwich. Although not totally set up, I let him have at it. He told me that it was delicious and tasted *exactly* like “real” grape jelly. Success!

If Pittsburgh had a train line, my town would be the last stop

Horse tied outside of The Halfway House Tavern, West Deer, PA

I love Pittsburgh. My town. The town I learned to love after finally figuring out, wherever you go, there you are. So, why not Pittsburgh? It’s what I know. It’s where my family is. These nudges are my peeps. I love everything about it. I have adopted a radical acceptance of my hometown.

I work in Lawrenceville, an urban neighborhood right outside of the city proper along the Allegheny River. I eat at Pho Minh Vietnamese restaurant where the friendly owners know my order off by heart and the food is consistently wonderful. I walk down the street in Bloomfield, where I lived for 8 years, and say hello to at least ten people within a two block walk. My former mailman greets me with a kiss every time I see him. I can drive to the strip district on my lunch hour to pick up terrible towels during the respective sports season. I can go across the 40th Street bridge to Yetter’s candy around Easter and buy goodies for the kids. I can visit Jean-Marc Chatellier’s French Bakery in Millvale in the morning and supply world-class french pastries to my work friends. I don’t want for anything in Pittsburgh.

A walking tour of Lawrenceville, PA:

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Now if you ask anyone for directions in Pittsburgh, and your follow up is “about how long will that take?” I guarantee you that the answer will be “about 20 minutes.” Go ahead and try it sometime, it’s hilarious. I am seriously 20 minutes away from acquiring mostly anything in the city.

However, I live 30 minutes north from where I work. Thirty minutes. Pittsburgh time is exponential, so thirty minutes is like an hour and a half in Pittsburgh minutes. My mother lives two suburbs over, TWO, and I might as well live in Toronto. If there were a bridge or a tunnel involved, I might never see her again. But alas, I do not live in Toronto, I live in West Deer, PA. I live on a street that has a higher alpaca to human ratio. And I love it. I am a five minute drive to my fishing lakes. I have chickens. My kids play in the creek in our back property. (That’s “crick” for the uninitiated.) My neighbors get around on golf carts and quads and dirtbikes. Our neighbor rode his tractor over to say hello the other day. Usually these visits involve a beer or two. Sometimes, they involve a neighbor taking apart your heat pump and re-routing some wiring. Most Pittsburgh neighbors are similar regardless of their town: they look out for you, they help you when you need it, and they let you live your life.

This is the Pittsburgh that I love. The beautiful dichotomy. Where I can go to a Penguins hockey game and then come home to a neighbor’s backyard skating rink.  Sometimes, I drive past The Halfway House bar a few miles from my house and there is a horse tied to a hitching post. It’s not a Canadian Mountie’s, but it’s as close as I’m gonna get…