Sweet Memories

Chokecherries were always a part of my childhood. I remember so well being out at my aunt and uncle's place on Pryor Creek and picking chokecherries and then lying on the bottom bunk of the kids' room eating them!!! If you've ever eaten a chokecherry, you will think that something had to be wrong with me to even think of eating one, let alone snacking on them! Well, I did.
But certainly the best thing about chokecherries was the syrup that my mother always made of them. In fact, I remember one of the first things I did with Walt when we first started dating was to go pick chokecherries with my mother. We all loved the syrup. Our favorite thing was to make waffles, slather on a thick layer of sour cream, and then pour on the chokecherry syrup.
Memories, sweet memories.
Now that we are living in Montana again one of my fave things is to be able to make chokecherry syrup myself. The only problem is that while there are a few bushes here in the valley, the growing season is so short that the berries never ripen. That means I have to find them elsewhere. The best place is around Billings, but a few years ago I found some at the Dillon Golf Course, so spent a couple days there harvesting their bushes. The batch of syrup I made today is from that harvest. Now I'm looking forward to some sourdough pancakes with my fresh batch of syrup! Yum, yum!!!