Monday, August 30, 2010

jammin'

It is a really easy process. Smash up some fruit, add the Certo, boil it, add the sugar and then jar. I been jammin' up a storm this summer. I've had some help from friends but it's been a fun and fruitful (pardon the pun) August. I've made blueberry jam and raspberry jam. All the time, waiting for the blackberries to be ready. The late August / early September picking window.  I received an email from my Aunt saying there were some ready so this weekend I went to Point Roberts and made did my annual blackberry jam session.

It has become a tradition. Making blackberry jam at the cottage with my friend Jen. It is quite the process and I have the scrapes, cuts and bruises to prove it. We both do. Blackberry is one of the most labour intensive jams. You don't just pick up a pound of blackberries at your local grocers - you have to pick it. Which means you have to hunt for it. You take a bucket on a bike and ride around picking whatever is within reach. And if it is just beyond your fingers touch you enter the bush just a bit to get it or walk down a path that states no trespassing but you see some berries that are within reach and you have to have them.  You want those berries. It becomes a short lived obsession.  

After collecting what we thought and hoped was 10 cups of juice filled berries we biked home. We took out the strainers and started the jam making process. Pressing all the berries through a strainer. You don't have to do this with many jams but blackberries have so many seeds that it is truly necessary. Unless, you want to provide a package of floss with every jam given as a gift.... Which, thinking about now, seems WAY easier. 

We did it - well almost. We needed one more cup. So out we went to the end of the road and found one more cup of berries. We smashed them up and added them in. 

After a quick boil, the addition of sugar (so much sugar!), a 5 minute stir, the sterilizing of the jars, jarring the jam, the cleanup - we were done. a mere 4.5 hours later. We each have 9 jars. We are exhausted. But worth it. Now, to find a gluten free bread worthy of this labour of love.

1 comment:

  1. I am exhausted just reading what went into that jammin' session and I lived it! Delicious and so worth it.

    ReplyDelete