Last year our apple tree produced 12 apples. We were very disappointed. Every other year we had a huge crop and always managed to dehydrate, freeze, turn into apple sauce, eat, and share a lot of apples.  We hoped the tree wasn’t on it’s last legs, but this year it was back to normal!

 

The last few weeks we have been picking a few apples here and there to test their ripeness. One evening the kids and I cored and peeled a large bowl of them and put them in the dehydrator. Here are Amy and Elliot helping me 🙂 A treat for them is to eat the peel as we work.

We decided a week ago they were ready, but I was away for the weekend, so we couldn’t harvest them. This weekend though, game on!

 

I pulled out all our containers, both ladders and set to work. I filled the below container in about 10 minutes.

These apples are a type of spartan we think, and are sweet, juicy, and very crispy. They are great in crumbles, pies, sauce, and just general eating.

As you can see, we ended up with a LOT of apples. Time to start handing them out!