Cherries, Chopsticks and Cousins...

I wonder if it was mere coincidence or perhaps one of those things that was just meant to happen.  Mark came home with four large bags of cherries the other day.  He knows that I love fruit of any sort but cherries rate right up there as one of my favorites.  The first bag was washed and eaten fresh but that still left three bags.  I needed to do something with the fruit but what? That is a lot of cherries to pit!  I pondered the fact.  Then I read where my cousin, Helen, had just picked some cherries and was making a wonderful pie!  Yum!  That sounded incredible!  Cherry pie! She had written that she pitted her cherries with a chopstick!  I had never heard of doing this!  I learn a lot from my cousins!

Two pounds of cherries that needed pitting.

Michael and I had to bring Ms. Put, the cat, in for her yearly visit to her veterinarian but afterward, I intended to make a pie or two!  While we were battling the cat (trying to crate her), a severe thunderstorm worked itself into a frenzy. The booming and banging did not make the crate thing much easier but finally we succeeded and off we went. (I have to admit that the sounds effects were most perfect for the ordeal in getting a windmill of cat claws inside a crate that seemingly shrinks to the size of a match box when in use!)  The rough weather brought back a flood (hehe) of memories!  I started beleaguering Michael with tales of thunderstorms during my childhood.  I always loved rainy, blustery days while at school.  Not so much at school but on the way home.  We rode the school bus and  it would pass Pop's fields before coming to a halt in front of the house.  From the open fields, we could see the house and if I saw the kitchen light on, I knew that something good was being baked!  Occasionally, Pop would be in the kitchen baking turnovers!  Aha!  Thunderstorms and Turnovers!  The idea hit me..I would make Cherry Turnovers!

Since we had no chopsticks, we used a wooden skewer.  Remove the stem and insert the stick.

Firmly push against the pit until it plops out the other side! Cherry is pitted!

Once we were home, Michael and I searched for chopsticks.  Hmmm..the Little Bayou House seemed devoid of any such devices!  Well now, where there is a will, there is a way!  Skewers! I had a multitude of those little rascals!  Using the back or larger end of the skewer, we poked the pit right out of the cherry!  This was rather easy!  Pull out the stem, insert the chopstick (skewer in our case), and push!  The seed shoves right out the other end of the cherry leaving a nice, clean hole but the cherry intact!  Easy-peasy!  It took Michael right at twenty five minutes to do two pounds of cherries.  While he did that, I made the dough.  After a bit, the house smelled divine with nine large turnovers baking in the oven!!!  Three of these will be given to my brother.  It is always better to share baked goods!

Three of the nine Cherry Turnovers that were baked today.

Now you tell me..coincidence?  I had cherries..Helen picked cherries.  I had no idea how to pit cherries..Helen told me!  Terrific thunderstorm hits..jogs memory of past storms and baking. I was to make a pie..Pop used to make Turnovers.  Hehe...So, I was taught to pit cherries with a chopstick so I could make Cherry Turnovers during a thunderstorm!  Personally, I think it was just meant to happen! Thank you, Helen!  I would have never thought of pitting cherries like this!