You know how Gollum is always talking about and scheming over his ‘precious’? Well that’s kinda how I feel about this nectar. I first made it last year and rationed it out over the winter so that we wouldn’t drink it all in a day (we certainly could have!) — it’s that good. This year, I’m making a lot more of it than I did last year so that I won’t have to hoard it too much for special occasions only. I’ve been watching like a hawk for the first apricots to make sure I don’t miss making this this year. Halleluia! it’s apricot season again!

When I was little, apricot nectar was *such* a treat. We didn’t get it very often because it was in a tetra pack and we usually got frozen juice, so when we did it was a *really* *big* *deal*. I remember it being sweet and apricoty and unlike any other juice. It was so good (this was 30 years ago when juices came in three flavours: orange, apple and grapefruit.)

I think that SunRype (that was the brand we got when I was little) stopped making it sometime in the nineties, but I think you can still find it made by other brands. In all honesty though, I hadn’t any of it in decades… until I found this recipe last year, and it did not disappoint.

To serve this, mix with water or sparkling water (Proseco might be nice too) at a ratio of 1:1. We’ve also served this as a palate cleanser in-between courses without diluting it at all.

The Recipe:

From The Joy of Jams, Jellies and Other Sweet Preserves by Linda Ziedric
Makes 4 pint jars

4 lbs ripe apricots, pitted
3 cups water
2/3 cup sugar (or more/less to taste)
6 tbsp fresh lemon juice (or more/less to taste)

How-To:

Put the pitted apricots and the water in a pot, and bring to a boil. Simmer, covered, for 10-15 minutes, until the apricots are very soft.

Pour into a blender or food processor and puree, then press the liquid through a sieve. When this is through, the texture will be thick — almost like a cream soup, but lump free.

Return to stove, and mix the apricot puree, sugar and lemon juice together. Bring again to a simmer.

Pour into sterilized jars, and process for 15 minutes.

Enjoy!

Not sure about the intricacies of canning? It’s not difficult even if you’re intimidated at first. Local Kitchen has a great post that lays out all the steps to do it right. (She’s a little more thorough than I am, but learning good habits is never a bad thing.)

In the past I haven’t been too keen on Raspberry Jam — mostly because of all the seeds. (Ironically, I come from a family where everyone has a raspberry patch in their back yard.) I’ve avoided the berries since moving far away from all the raspberry patches (“Why do people pay so much for something that comes from the backyard?”) and I didn’t think I was missing them much.

Over this past winter, though, I kept spotting recipes that called for raspberry jam. I knew I had to make some, not to eat, but so I’d have it ready for all those recipes! (“Why buy jam when you can make it yourself?”)

My not liking raspberry jam might have changed now, because without the seeds, I actually like this stuff! It’s tangy and just a little bit sweet and full of raspberry flavour and is *seed**free*. I’m now looking forward to the holidays not just because there will no longer be any Humidex warnings, but because I’ll be able to use this jam!

I based this recipe on my grandmother’s ratio for regular raspberry jam: 1 cup of fruit to 1 cup of sugar. Because I planned on removing the seeds, I tweeked the ratio to 5:4, but if you like it a bit sweeter, do the 1:1 ratio. I’ve seen some recipes that add in a bit of lemon juice (either for extra tang and/or to help set it) but I didn’t find that it was necessary.

The Recipe

Makes four 1 cup / 250mL jars

5 cups / 1250mL (aproximately 1 1/2 lbs) raspberries
4 cups / 1L sugar

How-To

Puree the berries in a food processor or blender, then press through a sieve with a fine screen to separate the seeds from the pulp (look at that incredible colour!)

Pour the berry pulp into a large saucepan and heat to a boil. Add the sugar and continue to simmer until it passes a gel test — this should take 10-15 minutes.

Skim off any foam and pour into sterilized jars (mine filled exactly four). Either refrigerate once cool or preserve using a hot water bath.

Enjoy!

Not sure about the intricacies of canning? It’s not difficult even if you’re intimidated at first. Local Kitchen has a great post that lays out all the steps to do it right. (She’s a little more thorough than I am, but learning good habits is never a bad thing.)

Notes

Mix the left over seeds and any of the foam skimmed from the jam with twice the amount of white vinegar in a jar and let sit for a few weeks away from the light. Strain and you’ll have raspberry vinegar to enjoy!

I only started making jam last year. It all got started when I was flipping through the BF’s copy of Fanny Farmer’s and stopped at the Jam, Jellies & Preserves section and realised how easy it was to make.

Suddenly it was like the lightbulb went on over my head and holiday gifting suddenly got a whole lot easier. (In my humble opinion,) jam is something that almost everyone enjoys, and uses — it doesn’t get tucked away and forgotten after a polite thank you and thoughts of “what am I going to do with this?”

After tasting my first batch, I was hooked — it only had three ingredients and I didn’t have to worry about any mysterious packages of pectin. It was delicious! and popular with other folks! and easy — have I mentioned yet how easy it is to make? Let me tell ya:

The Recipe

makes approximately three 1/2 pint / 250mL jars

(The great thing about this recipe is that it’s a ratio that works with most fruits, so if you’d like to switch it up a bit and add it something else, just make sure the ratio stays the same.)

4 cups chopped strawberries
3 cups sugar
juice of 1/2 a lemon — approximately 2 tbsp / 10mL

How-To

Place the strawberries and lemon juice in a large pot (bigger is better — the fruit will foam, so you want some extra room.)  and cook over medium heat until the fruit is tender.

Mash the strawberries (it’s okay to leave a few chunks of fruit if you like some whole fruit in your jam), then add the sugar and stir to dissolve. Bring to a boil and boil rapidly, stirring occasionally, until jam is thick and passes a gel test (this usually takes 10 – 15 minutes, but can vary).

Pour into jars and either refrigerate once cool or preserve using a hot water bath.

Enjoy!

Not sure about the intricacies of canning? It’s not difficult even if you’re intimidated at first. Local Kitchen has a great post that lays out all the steps to do it right. (She’s a little more thorough than I am, but learning good habits is never a bad thing.)

Last weekend I went to the farmer’s market and brought home the last two baskets of strawberries. The last two at the entire market! Unfortunately, they were a little bit softer than I would have liked. Too soft for an attempt at Strawberry Pie, or at more Strawberry Jam. Disappointing? You bet. Inspiring? Absolutely!

Last year I’d spotted a recipe for Slow Roasted Strawberries, and now that I was faced with berries that were a little ripper than I’d hoped, I realized this was my chance to try it out. A quick read through the instructions and I had to face facts: I didn’t have the time or the patience to slow roast berries for four hours — I had too many other things I needed that oven for!

Luckily, I’d just finished making some Roasted Rhubarb Jam that knocked my socks off. It was similar enough in theory (roasting fruits/plants not normally roasted) but it took a fraction of the time.

With nothing to loose, (the fruit was getting juicy) I decided to experiment. Holey bjeezus I’m so glad I did — this stuff is fantastic! It’s great with breads or pastries (how you’d normally use jam or other preserves) but has an intensity to its flavour that makes it great with savoury dishes too: try it with gamey meats like elk, bison or even lamb for a fun condiment

The Recipe

inspired by Roasted Rhubarb Jam from In Jennie’s Kitchen
makes approximately 3/4 cup / 185mL

12 oz. / 340g roughly chopped strawberries (big chunks are fine)
3/8 cup / 90mL sugar
1/8 tsp / 0.5mL ground ginger

How-To

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees (F) / 200 degrees (C).

Very lightly grease a 9×9 inch glass dish or use a non-stick version and do not prep the pan.

Put all three ingredients in the dish and stir to combine. Place in the oven and roast for 50 minutes — until the juice is bubbling and syrupy and the berries look roasted (before this point, the juice will look juicy and the berries will just look like they’ve warmed up.)

Remove from oven and allow to cool.

Roasted Strawberries should keep in the refrigerator for 2-3 weeks in a closed jar or container.

If you’d like to keep the Roasted Strawberries longer, and have used the non-stick pan option (with no oil) you can preserve them using a boiling water bath for a minimum of 10 minutes. (If you’ve used oil, it can affect the preserving process, and I can’t guarantee that they will preserve properly.)

Enjoy!

Strawberries? Yum!

Black pepper? Tasty.

Strawberries and black pepper? That sounds … interesting. (What the hell is she thinking???)

Yeah, okay, up until last summer, black pepper paired with fruit was a little bit of a foreign concept to me too. But trust me on this — it’s worth giving a try. No, really — grab a strawberry, or a slice of fresh pineapple, and crack some pepper over it. Tasty, right? Yeah, I thought so too!

This jam has all the goodness of homemade strawberry jam, with a little kick of black pepper. The black pepper is not too dominant while still staying present (although it does heat up a little more when the jam is warmer). If you’re one of those people who have a hard time getting going in the morning, this might perk you up a bit without slapping you across the face — figuratively speaking, of course — kinda like a mild-to-medium salsa.

The Recipe

makes approximately 3- 1 cup / 250mL jars

4 cups / 1L roughly chopped strawberries
3 tbsp. / 45mL fresh lemon juice (reserve the peel & pips)
3 cups / 750mL sugar
1 tsp. / 5mL fresh ground black pepper

How-To

Place the strawberries and lemon juice in a large sauce pan and cook over medium heat until the fruit is tender. Mash the strawberries, then add the sugar and pepper and stir to dissolve. Secure the lemon peel and pips in a spice bag or cheese cloth and add to the pan. Bring to a boil and boil rapidly, stirring occasionally, until jam is thick and passes a gel test (this usually takes 10 – 15 minutes, but can vary).

Pour into jars and either refrigerate once cool or preserve using a hot water bath.

Not sure about the intricacies of canning? Local Kitchen has a great post with all sorts of info to get you started. She’s a little more thorough than I am, but learning good habits is never a bad thing.

Sometimes what you start out planning to make isn’t what you finish with in the end. And sometimes that’s not a bad thing.

A few weeks ago, the BF requested some rhubarb jam. Plain old rhubarb jam with nothing else — no strawberries, no blueberries, no pineapple. I set to the job figuring that my usual ratio of 4 cups of fruit and 3 cups of sugar would do the job, and it did… kinda.

It seems that rhubarb has no naturally occurring pectin — I knew this (but ignored it) going into the project and figured it wouldn’t be an issue since my strawberry jam last year worked out fine. Well, in order to get it to the gel point, I had to cook it a lot longer than usual — 30 or so minutes to the regular 10-15. The jam tasted fine, but had a caramel-like flavour to it because it was over-cooked. (The BF also noted that it had lost the tangy-ness often associated with rhubarb. I responded that anytime you added that much sugar to something, it was bound to taste just plain sweet!)

I looked around, and couldn’t find any recipes for plain-old rhubarb jam that didn’t use commercial pectin or gelatin (why is that?) Thinking about it, and looking at recipes for other types of jam, I determined that I needed to add some lemon to the next batch. It turned out that I added more lemon than necessary, and ended up making a lovely syrup.

This recipe doesn’t make an end-product with a strong rhubarb tang to it, but a sweet combination of lemon and rhubarb. Possible uses include:

• on pancakes
• on oatmeal
• as a mix in drinks — with carbonated water, proseco or champagne, for instance

The Recipe

makes 4 – 1/2 half-pint / 250mL jars

4 cups / 1000mL rhubarb, cut into 1/2 inch / 1.5cm chunks
3 cups / 750mL white sugar
juice of 3 lemons (approx. 10 tbsp / 150mL)
zest of 1 lemon

How-To

Wash jars and prep for canning.

Put the rhubarb into a large pot with a splash of water (just enough to keep the rhubarb from scorching.) Heat on high until the fruit softens — it will release quite a bit of moisture. Mash the rhubarb, and then add the sugar, lemon juice and zest and stir to dissolve. Bring to a simmer. Stir occasionally and continue to heat for approximately 20 minutes — it will have thickened, but will not gel in a saucer test. (If it does gel, congratulations! you’ve made jam!)

Optional: if you like a smooth syrup, strain the liquid from the solid rhubarb bits at this point.

Fill clean jars and cap. If you are planning on keeping these jars for longer than 3 weeks, preserve in a boiling water bath.