I only read one book this past month: “And Then There Were None” by Agatha Christie. I barely worked out (shhhh… don’t tell my Summer Challenge participants). And I rarely wrote.
That’s what the hot humid summer days did to me while I was in Denmark, a Northern European country with no air conditioning and a propensity for weather’s irony that when you really need a cool breeze on a hot day, there is none. On all the other days with rain and overcast weather, the wind was brutal and relentless, just like I remembered it from living here, 90% of the time.
At the beginning of summer, we had a discussion of where the best juice is from. My youngest said, grandmother’s home made. My mom heard the jury and went straight ahead to make concentrated juice, the old fashioned way. With berry bushes in the backyard of the townhome, there are always bags of frozen fruit in the freezer plus sweet frozen plums from collaborator, Anne-Grethe.
We visited Anne-Grethe and Peter’s home, because they had the right pot for making juice. My parents’ induction plates did not agree with the juice maker pot. It was perfect for combining cozy conversation with frozen fruit while waiting for time to pass.
The bottom part of the pot is filled with hot water that steams the fruit which in turn releases the sweet liquid into the middle pot and out through the tube.
In today’s society of produce-consume-don’t waste time, we so often put ideas in a pot, let them percolate for a while but never give them time to get to the juicy parts. Mostly, we’ve already consumed thousands of trash posts on social media and the internet before we’ll sit with a 500 page book or even go to an art exhibit and sit with a painting that speaks to us.
This painting really captured my mood of despair, dispirit and grief when we went to the Getty Museum before our flight from LAX. We left Thursday July 2nd, exactly a week later my dearest friend left this earth.
In return I really resonated with the old woman in her garden at the local art museum in Skive, Denmark. The way I spent extra minutes with her was by making a sketch. It was like she was telling me to slow down, enjoy the tiny details of the flowers that grow in the garden, there are still things to appreciate.
There is nothing like death and destruction to remind you that paying attention to details will bring you back to what really matters.
A perfect example were the times I found a fossilized sea urchin at Vadum beach, in front of a cottage in Løkken and in the driveway of the farm where my parents buy farm eggs.
But back to the juice. The conversation flowed easily between my parents and their friends. We had coffee and ice cream. I looked at the decoupaged kitchen door, that Anne-Grethe had decorated with recipes back in the 1980’s. Old recipe books are like time capsules, they tell of a time when a fruit salad was exotic, and that baking your own bread is no big deal.
And then the juice was out of the fruit. Squeezed by heat like a lesson in chemistry and love.
If the fruit had been without stems and pits, one could have used the remaining pulp to put in muffins or make jam. But this went in to green waste.
The idea had percolated, now it was time to finish the concentrate. We carried the pot with the hot liquid to the car and returned home, where my mom returned the pot to the stove and brought the juice back to a boil. Then sugar and Atamon (a food preservative) were added. Three kilos of fruit became three liters of juice to which was added one kilo of sugar.
Excess foam was removed from the juice, then the concentrated juice chilled for a bit before it was put on bottles.
Six bottles of black currant/plum concentrate.
My youngest easily drinks a full pitcher of juice (one part concentrate to eight parts water) in one sitting. This is where the consumer comes in.
It took my mom and her friend an afternoon to make the product. Maybe 2.5 hours in total (add time to pick the fruit and bag it to the freezer). It was not complicated, full of natural vitamin C and absolutely no dangerous E numbers.
Growing up, my parents would not only make their own juice, but jams, pickled beets and cucumbers. My grandmother would bake cookies and crackers, pickled vegetables, more jams and strawberry cream to share with the whole family.
I laughed out loud, when my oldest teen complained “I hate living in an ingredient household” this past year (I admit we do have our share of granola bars, store bought crackers and the like). I hope our kids have learned the joy, pride and taste of something home made; The fruits of labor and patience. Oh how those virtues are lacking in modern society where convenience and faster, bigger, cheaper are chosen before quality (for those of us who have the privilege to choose).
In my previous post I lamented about my overcommitment while this summer I’ve spent enjoying a slower pace of seeing friends and family, and travel around my home country. I lost a friend and now said goodbye to my oldest who is flying from the nest and across the continents to settle in Denmark. It’s too many goodbyes for my little tender heart.
Now I’m heading back to ease into work at the gym, those writing tasks waiting, a new work commitment etc. My hope is the patience and small joys of life will stay with me at home.
Thank you for following my writing. I write primarily about events in and around Redlands that support our local community and make this city a better place. Sometimes, I write about the aspects of our community that we need to protect.
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In Gratitude,
Siw
Siw, I’m so glad you could have a slow summer. I’m sure your soul needed it.
This is lovely, Sue. I enjoyed seeing glimpses of Denmark and museums and beaches and JUICE! You are getting the juice out of life.