Home Alone

Paul is in Washington playing bridge for the next week or so.

I am now settling into my routine.

Dogs have been walked.

Dogs have been fed.

Cardbox has been cleared.

Yesterday was a first. I actually got picked as the lucky respondent to a freecycle offer. Assorted Kilner jars. They are actually Le Parfait 'super' jars and I need to get some new seals, which I have found are available from a few sites on the net. And the very large one is broken in as much as the metal clip is missing from the lid but I will find a way of using it. Maybe try to grow and pickle onions next year. All in all I am very pleased with them.

I swapped a jar of alpine strawberry and a jar of wild gooseberry jam (in photo) for Margaret's redcurrants yesterday, which she then helped me pick whilst we had a good natter. They need processing today. Maybe freeze some rather than use them all for jelly.

And I'm waiting for the rain to stop (hopefully this afternoon) as the raspberries up the road need picking sooner rather than later.

I don't know if it is just the very strange weather we have had this year but everything seems to need harvesting at the same time this year and I am failing to keep up with it all.

And the Latest Flavour Is...

So, after picking 9 lbs of gooseberries yesterday it was jam making day today. But not gooseberry...

The dog walk this morning took me past the wild raspberry stands I have been keeping an eye on, and after two days of sunshine, lollipops and rainbows there now appeared to be enough ripened to make it worth a trip to pick them. I was not wrong. I filled two punnets from just the first stand despite eating quite of few of the squishier ones. I think wild raspberries are the best tasting fruit in the world. I decided to leave the other patch for the birds, at least until the next time I think it may be worth the effort - which may be sooner than I expected.

Two pounds when I weighed my booty. Into the jam pan this afternoon, gooseberries ousted.

Words cannot express how good it tastes... definitely the best one yet.

Wild Strawberry Jam

So I was out dodging the drizzle - well, actually not dodging the drizzle this morning - picking my alpine strawberries. After having to eat the overripe ones I ended up with two pounds...

I searched the web unsuccessfully for a recipe and in the end decided to just treat them as 'normal' strawberries - equal quantities of sugar to fruit.

Wash/dry strawberries and place in jam pan with no extra water. Heat gently, stirring until they started to go mushy. Add the sugar and stir until all dissolved. Add juice of one lemon. Bring to the boil with no stirring. It reached the setting point after about five minutes. Take off the heat. Remove scum. Leave until begins to thicken in the pan. Stir to distribute fruit more evenly within the jam. Pot up.

It is an absolutely gorgeous colour and has given a really good yield. The pan scrapings tasted rather good too...

Alcoholic Sloe Jam

Anne invited Penny and me over for dinner on Thursday, and I suggested to Penny that she stayed overnight here so that she could have a drink. After polishing off a bottle of red between us with dinner (Anne was not drinking) I decided it was a good idea when we got home to decant one of my sloe alcohols - they have now been maturing away between six and eight months. I can confirm that sloe vodka is just as good as sloe gin...

Yesterday I bottled up the rest - two bottles of gin, one bottle of the Aldi's 'voshka' and two pints of vodka - the only problem with vodka is that the bottles have these integrated pourers which I could not remove so it is now back in a plastic milk bottle - very refined :)

Last night I boiled up the five pounds of alcohol laden sloes in a pint of water and then spent a good two hours forcing it all through a sieve to end up with about a pint and a half of pulp. I probably could have got a little more but it's damned hard work and return on effort diminishes after the initial scraping of each spoonful. I must say the house smells good...

This morning after the dog walk I made the jam. I added another half pint of water as the pulp was pretty thick and boiled it up. Then added a pound and a half of jam sugar - fresh sloes may be full of pectin but I assumed that these no longer were. Boiled hard for about 15 minutes and it appears to be setting fine. I had the scrapings of the pan/spoon/ladle on cream crackers for lunch, and have just over three pounds in jars.

I probably shouldn't have had any for lunch as I found many typos/bad grammar in this post that needed correcting. Hopefuly, if not perfect at least better now...

Autumn Mix Jelly

The rosehips (1 lb) and brambles (3/4 lb) went into the jelly bag Friday night, producing half a pint of juice. The crabapples (unweighed, but I guess about 1 1/2 lb) and half a pound of sloes were strung up last night. I decided to cheat this morning and squeeze the jelly bag - this if for home consumption only and a little cloudiness won't bother me. I combined the juice - a pint and a quarter in total.

My Margaret Patten recipe book advised to only stir until the sugar is dissolved and then boil hard without stirring. I decided to try this - previously I have kept stirring throughout.

There was a lot more scum doing it this way, but it was easy to remove the majority of it with a vegetable spoon without wasting too much of the jelly. Another tip in the book that worked well was dabbing the last of the scum with white paper kitchen roll. It was also a lot more relaxed in getting the saucers from the freezer to test for the setting point, and the jars from the oven when it was ready - which was a lot quicker than previously. Luckily I had just finished ladling it into the jars when the phone rang.

I then got back to the kitchen for the best part - scraping the jelly remains from the pan/ladle etc for tasting on a couple of cream crackers. It is scrummy...

The Start of the Jam Season

I picked the gooseberries on Monday evening. Several of them were starting to split and I could wait no longer. Three and three quarter pounds, with two and three quarters coming from just two bushes and only another pound from the other ten or so. I washed and prepared them when I got in.

I called in on Margaret on Tuesday for a coffee. She said I could pick the remaining red currants from her bush, and showed me where it was. Karen had already had three pounds from it, but it was still loaded. Mine haven't done anywhere near as well as last year - they are in quite a shady spot and the weather this year has not helped. They are only just starting to ripen.

I made the gooseberry jam after the afternoon dog walk, producing about seven pounds. I took a jar around to Margaret after lunch the next day and a couple of punnets for the red currants.

I filled both punnets easily - four and three quarter pounds. When I got home I washed them ready for making jelly. After the evening dog walk I heated them up and crushed them, and then loaded the jelly bag...

It splashed a little so I came up with the opposite configuration to reduce the distance from bag to bowl. I thought I could enter it into an art exhibition...

I left it for 24 hours, by which time it was under a drip/minute. I got just over 2 pints of juice, which has converted to about four pounds of jelly.

Elderberry and Bramble jam

Spurred on by my earlier success I decided to experiment further. My neighbours have rallied to my request for jars, and I have now built up quite a stock.

There was an elder tree just the other side of the bridge dripping with ripe berries. I decided this must belong to Iona and Hedley who live in the house on the other side of the river to us and went to ask if they wanted the berries. On arriving there I was greeted by Iona's mother - Iona had been taken to hospital and she was expecting news of imminient third grandchild. She thought it would be fine to pick the berries as they would have other things to worry about.

On our 4 p.m. walk Hedley was driving back and stopped to let us know that Iona had had another boy, Wilfred, at lunch time and both were doing fine. I could pick as many berries as I liked...

After the walk I wandered over and picked about half a carrier bag full. I spent the evening removing the berries from their stalks with a fork, and ended up with about two and a half pounds.

I went brambling the next morning down the path to the field opposite our neighbour Margaret. I got about two pounds in about half an hour - they are so abundant. The recipe I had seen suggested equal amounts of elderberries and blackberries so I got another half a pound from the patch at the bottom of our drive.

I was all set after lunch to go. This was when I realised there was a major problem. I still don't have a jam pan, and was using a large saucepan. However, the saucepan was not large enough for the volume of fruit I had picked! I decided to process the elderberries first, and just extract the juice. I then measured how much I had - a pint and a half. Okay- reduce the recipe by about a third. I used one pint of juice and added a pound and three quarters of blackberries. Quickly calculated I needed about 3 pounds of sugar - recipes vary between three quarters and a pound of sugar per pound of fruit. The pan was still very full, and although I was trying to be very careful it still boiled over at one point. But it eventually reached the setting point, and I was fully prepared this time with jars ready. I got about four and a half pounds of jam this time.

I tried some today - it has a very distinctive strong flavour, presumably from the elderberries, and is a lovely deep red colour. It should last a long time as you don't need to use much to get the taste. The rosehip and apple has a much subtler flavour, and is a lovely orange colour - although Paul described it as vibrant.

I may use the spare juice with crab apples next...

Rose Hip and Apple Jelly

On our many walks around the neighbourhood with the dogs I couldn't help noticing the great free crops available in the hedgerows - abundances of blackberries, elderberries, crab apples and rose hips.

I have already been brambling - blackberry and apple crumble...

Today I was more adventurous, having found many recipes for rose hip jelly. There was a dog rose covered in them right over the road from my house. Off I trotted, and got the best part of a pound and a half. Completed the 2 pounds from a bush just up the hill from us. Realised I needed lemon juice for the recipe so drove into Duns. Couldn't decide on whether to use fresh lemons or just buy juice so got both. As it was, the juice of one and a half lemons was enough. Already had some cooking apples - a couple left over from the crumble and half a dozen from some kindly soul in Duns who had left a 'help-yourself' boxful outside their gate. Only other ingredient needed was sugar - and I had bought some jam sugar the last time we were in Berwick.

Now for the hard work. It took me over an hour and a half to wash, top/tail and chop up two pounds of rose hips. Added 2 pints of boiling water and simmered until the rose hips very soft. Sieved the whole caboodle to just get the juice/puree.
Chopped up apples - I used about a pound and three quarters before coring/peeling, and cooked in a little water until very soft. Pushed through sieve into rose hip juice.
Added about 3 fluid ounces lemon juice and one and a quarter pounds of sugar.
Boil/stir. Keep boiling/stirring. Tested after about 15 minutes - no sign of setting. Kept boiling/stirring. Turned up heat and boiled/stirred hard. Eventually it began to show signs of setting.

Poured into sterilised jam jars - my cousin Maureen suggested a good way to sterilise jars is to heat them in the oven to 100 degrees C. Cover top of jam with those little waxed discs you can buy. Wait until completely cooled before putting cellophane tops on.

Well, that is the first time I have ever made jam/jelly - about two and a half pounds in the end. I am already planning my next project...

Lessons learnt:
Be more organised.
May be better to mash rose hips with potato masher before sieving to get the most from them.
May be better to soften apples in a little of the rose hip juice rather than more water - should reduce time required to boil.
Boiling means boiling - not simmer/boil but really boil the hell out of it.
It is damned hard work sieving apple puree...

Many thanks go to Paul for assisting in getting the jars out of the oven at the critical moment , placement of little wax discs and cleaning up all the mess I had made.

p.s. We have now tried it on toast and it is very good...