Cherry-Picking Season

This afternoon was spent picking about 5 large bowls of cherries.  About half were like the red cherries in the picture I posted here.  The other half are Black Heart cherries like these.  They are so sweet and very flavorful.

The red cherries were pitted first using my antique cherry pitter.  It isn't perfect but certainly faster than doing the job by hand.  Then I pitted the Black Heart cherries and oh my!  My hands turned a very dark red and then after rinsing all the sticky juice off, my hands were stained blue.  Sorry I didn't think to take a picture but really my hands were too messy to get near my camera.  Barkeeper's Friend cleanser took most of the stain out, but my hands and most especially my fingernails still look dark.  I think these cherries would produce some very potent dye for anyone wanting to experiment. 

But the up side to all this is that I now have lots of cherries in the freezer.  They should taste good next winter in a good cobbler. 

Carol