FOXY LOXY JAM
I have recently got into Jam Making. I have a fine collection of books on preserving and making jams and cordials etc. I decided to start off with something simple, and opted for the Strawberry Jam.
I went to the Pick Your Own at Binsey Farm, near Port Meadow in Oxford. It was a rainy day and there was just me there, all alone in the fields collecting my 2 kilos worth of Strawberries.
I rushed home and set to on my alchemy!
After preparing my own pectin from cooking apples I eventually made about 8 good-sized jars of jam. It was very nice, so definitely something which I wanted to try again and experiment with.
Binsey Farm strawberry field, from the carSo off I went, back to the PYO. This time the sun was shining and the strawberry fields were much busier, so I opted for the lonesome gooseberry field.
The deserted gooseberry field. Just me and the gooseberries.and raspberries...
I even wore my special strawberry belt and polka dot top!
The punnet of gooseberries ready to go in the pan!
To me, jam making and preserving is like alchemy. The equipment, the colours, textures, smells and of course - the taste.
I have always had a love of old fashioned laboratories and would love to have worked in a perfumery. All the bottles, raw materials, and the imagery of a certain magic evolving within the glass conical flasks and pipes!
Well, if I can't have that, jam making will have to do.
I would love a copper preserving pan (one which I could spend hours polishing), but until then I found this rather nice aluminium one in the Oxfam shop for a mere £15. It does the job, plus it has a rather nice old hammered handle with a nice curl on the end, so it satisfies my aesthetic need too.
So, without wanting to bore you with the facts of jam making I will whip through the different stages and try to illustrate them with photos instead.
These are the gooseberries softening in the water. Apparently gooseberries contain a high level of pectin so there is no need to add any extra to this recipe. Look at my thermometer, lovely!
When the gooseberries have softened you throw in the raspberries and just when they start to bleed you add the mounds of sugar. This is one of my favourite stages. I love the way the brilliant whiteness stands out from the colour of the fruit.
So once all the fruit has been added, you have to get it up to the right temperature and to a rolling boil.
220F
The next stage is to check for the setting point. It is important to remove the pan from the heat each time you do this.
a chilled plate used to test the setting point...
The setting point is reached...
I like using a funnel to ladle the jam into sterilised jars.
Sealed and ready to be labelled and packaged.
oh, and eaten...with toast or homemade scones.
and a pot of tea.
Someone else likes toast and jam too!The next job is creating the labels. That will be my next post!
