Jelly, Jam, and Marmalade

I don’t know how it suddenly became mid-August. Soon the berries will be gone and we’ll be deep in apples. Last week I realized that I hadn’t made any strawberry or raspberry jam, our favorites, and now it’s too late. For many years I made the freezer version from recipes supplied by Sure Jell or Certo The fruit is simply mixed with sugar and the pectin. No cooking means that it retains the fresh fruit flavor.

The strawberries and raspberries are done but blueberries and blackberries are still fairly plentiful. The blackberry seeds are a bit much so I decided to make jelly. I crushed the berries and then put them in a bag made from layers of cheese cloth. I hung it on a hook and let it drip overnight. The next morning I made the jelly following the Sure Jell recipe for cooked jelly. It turned out well so I thought I’d try some others but that was all the pectin I had bought.

On the Internet I found several recipes for Apricot Preserves and Jam. They all seemed pretty simple. Just fruit and sugar cooked down until it thickens. Off to the orchard where I got the very last apricots in the store. Home again I weighed the fruit. It wasn’t exactly the amount in the recipes so I just used all I had, added some sugar, the juice of a lemon, and a little water and simmered it in a big pot, stirring occasionally, more often as it thickened. I ladled it into jars and did a 10 minute water bath. It turned out beautifully, a little thicker than I might have wished, but good.

Two successes and I was getting into it. I’ve had a recipe for Ginger-Peach Marmalade for years. I’d never made it but I happened to have an orange, a lemon, and some ginger root in the fridge. Back to the orchard for peaches. Everything went into the pot with sugar and soon it was bubbling away. It was a huge success. The different fruits along with the ginger gave it complexity that was especially appealing. I cooked it a little less long and it turned out perfectly.

While this was cooking I chopped up a couple of cups of mint, simmered it in four cups of water and set it aside to steep. I planned to make mint jelly. When I drained the water off, it had turned brown and unattractive. I dumped it all. When I told a friend about the failure. She said I should have added some green food coloring and it would have been fine.

I had been thinking of making some Peach-Blueberry Jam and maybe some Blackberry-Rhubarb (there’s still rhubarb in the freezer) but suddenly, I decided that I’d lost interest in jam.

Until next year!