Tag: jam

The Other Quince

Japanese quince flowers are truly enchanting in the spring. But the fruit that ripen in mid-fall sure aren’t pretty: hard to the touch and to the teeth, gnarly, pitted, inhabited often. Raw they are so tart that they’ll make your mouth puckers (if you don’t 

When You Have Green Tomatoes

  When I have green tomatoes and baby ginger, I make Green Tomato Jam With Baby Ginger. Because, I have pickled green tomatoes and made green tomato relish in the past… but we don’t eat that much of it.  So the pickles and the relish 

Fig Jam with Lemon & Sweet Wine

I have not made as much jam this year as last year – mostly because I still have lots of jam left from last year.

But when an offer to come over and pick ripe Brown Turkey figs came recently, I had no choice but make fig jam. The figs were really ripe and soft and were not going to keep.

Cut up and sugared figs, resting for the night

Figs are naturally very sweet, so I don’t use quite as much sugar as other jams. They are, however, one of the few fruits not acid enough to can using a boiling water-bath method without acidifying first (elderberries are another such). So I always use lots of lemon – and wine also adds some acidity.

So yes, it is sweet, but it still works quite nicely with cheese or cold meat.

But I am going to have to be careful: last year,  I made a lot  of fig jam. Or so I thought … so was handing jars left and right for the holidays… until I realized – way too late in January – that I had given them ALL away! I maybe fig-jam selfish this year!

Canned!

Fig Jam With Lemon & Sweet Wine Continue reading Fig Jam with Lemon & Sweet Wine

The Eighth & Ninth Days of Christmas (Meyer Lemon Marmalade)

Still working through my citrus boxes. On the Eight Day, the Meyer lemons poached the previous night got squeezed, sliced, briefly simmered with sugar, and rested overnight again. It’s important that the rind softens as much as possible or the marmalade will have an unpleasant 

Winter Preserve

Just because it’s winter does not mean you can’t make jam from local fresh fruit. Guess what kind of jam I am making? Apricot you say? They are a chancy crop around here and I never get enough to freeze for later to make jam 

Ode to the Autumn Olive

autumn-olives-003

I have know for a while that autumn olives (Elaeagnus umbellata) were edible. I just never took the time to go after them. But this year seems to be the year when I started to forage more consistently (bird cherries, wineberries, elderberries, chestnuts, Japanese quince, pawpaws, wild grapes etc) and so when a shrub of autumn olives shimmering in yesterday’s morning sun called to me, I grabbed a bucket and I started to pick. Let me tell you what a nice way to while away an hour it was (and do something useful too!). Warm (but not too warm) sun on my back, the berries like little prayer grains under my fingers, my mind ticking all the reasons such a cursed plant (by some) provides for thankfulness. Because, truly, what’s not to like about autumn olives? Continue reading Ode to the Autumn Olive

On Ground Cherries

Shall we talk about ground cherries? mmm… say you politely, really? Ground cherries? You are not the only one to wonder… the year I gave ground cherry jam to friends for Christmas, I got some puzzled looks: this is cherry? you grind them? why? that’s 

The Easiest Jelly in the World

I have said my goodbye to fresh sour cherries for this year. I have frozen and made jam with a bucket of them – and of course enjoyed quite a few in cobblers and eaten them “au naturel”. But for the cook with a liking