A meyva bonanza

It’s May and fruit season has come to Azerbaijan! Fruit is available throughout the year, really, but not all fruits and certainly not my favorites. Everything is seasonal and only certain things are imported, such as bananas and, if you’re in Baku, things like avocados. But out here in the rayons, you have to go with what’s in season. And right now that means strawberries, cherries and alchar. Alchar is something we don’t commonly eat in the States. They appear to be unripe plums; they are the right size, have the same pit inside and have the same look as a plum, but they’re eaten when they’re hard and super, duper sour. They taste an awful lot like one of the best Granny Smith apples you’ve probably ever had. But they’re tiny.

For the past couple of weeks I’ve been buying strawberries and each morning smooshing some of them up, adding a little sugar, and spooning the resulting slop on buttered toast. It’s messy and delicious and I’m going to be very, very sad when strawberry season ends this month. It’s also cherry season, though. I indulged this week and bought a kilo of cherries and have been snacking on a few each day. The kilo will probably last at least ten days if I snack industrially. Then came yesterday.

Yesterday, when I was juuuuust nodding off for a nap, I get a phone call. It’s the agronomist from my garden project and he’s saying something about coming to my apartment building and something else about cherries. Then he hangs up, so I grumble a bit as I change into something more appropriate for going out in public and the phone rings again. It’s him again, basically asking where I am. I asked him when he means to do this (whatever it is) and he says, “Indi!” Now. Exasperated, I look out the window and see his car. As I go downstairs, he’s trying to give a bag of stuff to some random guy, telling him to give it to me. What he doesn’t realize is I’m not on speaking terms (let alone a first-name basis) with everyone in my entire apartment complex and this guy has no idea who I am or where I live. Luckily for him, that’s when I walk up. I thank him and thank the agronomist for the huge bag of fruit he’s apparently just harvested and brought to me and he takes off.

As I go back to my apartment I wonder what the heck I am to do with what appears to be another three kilos of cherries?! And alchar? And several semi-ripe apricots? Some of the cherries were torn from the tree, part of their branches and leaves still attached. I put the bag in the refrigerator and decided to address it when I was in a better state of mind.

So here I am, the next day, pitting and freezing a big bowlful of assorted types of cherries. I’ve never baked a cherry pie but might just attempt one. At the very worst, I’ll have frozen cherries to snack on in September. When meyva season is finished.