Allergies, Be Damned!

The smell of lilacs is like the nectar of the gods. The sad thing is, it only lasts about a week. So, what is one to do?

Well, in my case, I take a trip to Madison's Arboretum and stick my face in blooming lilacs for about an hour and a half. By the time I'm done, I've gotten my lilac fix (and I've sneezed my head off) and don't feel quite as bad when the blooms start to brown and drop.

So, let's start with the Arboretum (lovingly referred to as The Arb). The University of Wisconsin Arboretum is actually a research facility - acres and acres of land - gardens and prairies - that's used for environmental and ecological study. Their mission is to conserve and restore Arboretum lands, advance restoration ecology, and foster the land ethic." And, to the delight of thousands of people, it's open to the public for all manner of fun. The history of the Arb is fascinating and it's wonderful to know that all this gorgeous land (and water!) in the middle of our city will be preserved for the foreseeable future.

My all-time favorite part of the Arb is the lilac grove. There are, quite literally, hundreds of varieties of lilacs. Large flowered, small flowered, double-flowered, trees, bushes, sweet smelling, spicy smelling, and even one that smells slightly of feet. Adjacent to the lilac grove is the cherry and apple grove so it's easy enough to wander from the heady scent of lilac over to the blooming trees for a bit of a palate cleanser. I love that the cherry and apple trees bloom concurrent with the lilacs. It makes the trip doubly fun. 

Here, in pictures, is a summary of my trip to the Arb last Friday. We had a stunningly gorgeous late afternoon promenade and stuck our faces in every single lilac bloom. Halfway through I started sneezing but, as the title suggests, allergies be damned - I was going to get my fill!

Enjoy!

My friend didn't sneeze as much as me.

Blue skies and sun!

These are the tags on the trees - in case you want to identify the variety.

Look at the crazy curl on these flower petals!

Entering the apple & cherry tree grove.

Then we wandered into the maple grove.

This Norway Maple was one of the biggest trees I've ever seen.

Wildflowers by the visitor's center.

Sweet-Tart

Lately it seems like the entire blogosphere has been taken over by posts about strawberry and rhubarb. Totally understandable. Everyone gets so excited about the advent of summer that we can't keep a lid on our trips to the farmer's market or the blooming peonies in our yards. I know here in the Midwest we have a precious few months of pure summer, so we hold them dear.

Lilacs at the Madison Farmer's Market.

And this isn't even a crowded day.

So, I'm going to add to the many posts about strawberry and rhubarb...

This weekend I did something new - I made jelly (strawberry-rhubarb, of course!) Now, many of you are probably seasoned jelly-making veterans but  I'm a complete newbie. My only resource was my cousin Julie who has a thimbleful of knowledge on this subject so she invited me over to help with the sweet, sticky mess.

This is the brand we chose to run with.

We followed the directions for cooked jam by the trusted experts at the Sure Jell company. Since neither Julie nor I are particularly good at math, deciphering the ratios of the fruit to pectin caused a little bit of heartache, but we didn't let that stop us. (I am the queen of "eyeballing" it, btw.) I don't really have a recipe to share with you since, like I said, we just followed the instructions on the box but I can tell you that one of the modifications we made to the original recipe was to not add the butter. It seemed arbitrary and in the end our finished product was just fine without it.

Cutting up pints and pints of strawberries.

Cooking down rhubarb until it became mush.

The other recipe alteration we made was to cut way back on the sugar because we were trying to achieve a jelly that is a little bit more tart. I think we added half the amount that was called for on the box.

Skimming, skimming, and more foam skimming.

 Neither of us has a proper canning pot with a basket (I am going to remedy that shortly) so we made "freezer jelly". That means that, once the jars are filled and cooled, they were popped into the freezer - except for one that went in the fridge for immediate use. And wow! It is seriously tasty! Sweet, tart and curiously fresh tasting compared to store-bought jelly.

Jars of goodness waiting to be frozen.

The effort was enough of a success that I now have the jelly-making bug. I would really, really, like to try this again - and get better at it. Since this adventure, I have been browsing for recipes on the web and dreaming about all sorts of flavors. Overall, the process was pretty easy and yet it helped satisfy that "pioneer" urge I get to make things from scratch.

–Cassandra (aka Half Pint)