Sara Homemaker
“Love flies, runs, and rejoices; it is free and nothing can hold it back." —Thomas a Kempis
It has been a week or so of homey pursuits, balanced by a healthy amount of strategy guide copyediting work.
I didn’t have to work this past weekend and so I took my father up on his offer of a jam-making jam session. My folks have a brilliant plum tree. Actually, it’s the neighbors’ plum tree, but a good portion of it leans over onto my parents’ side of the fence. The tree is old and bountiful, with gnarly black bark; its plums are sweet, firm, and pleasantly tart, not mushy or bitter. We’ve been eating gorgeous, bronze-colored plums steadily since the first week in August. On Saturday, Dad and I picked two big buckets full of plums. We have not yet come close to exhausting the fruit on that part of the tree.
In three jam sessions, Dad and I have produced 35 half-pint jars of delicious jam—something we’ve never done together before. We didn’t bother peeling the fruit because we wanted a bit of pulp in the jam.
We had a glitch with the first batch of jam. We halved the sugar in the recipe because the plums were so deliciously sweet and tangy, we didn’t want to oversweeten it. (Evil Sugar.) But we didn’t realize how important sugar is to the jelling process. We didn’t have low-no sugar pectin at first and the jam didn’t set up right. Then we got the low-no sugar pectin and subsequent batches turned out fine.
We even saved the first batch by reboiling it, adding the low-no sugar pectin, and rejarring it all. We figured it was worth a try, but we would have been satisfied with our plum syrup if it hadn’t worked. It would have been scrumptious on pancakes or ice cream.
This is a new skill for me. I’ve made jam a couple of times in my life, but only twice in my memory—both times fairly recently. Now that some of the mystery about the process has been dispelled through doing it, I’m more willing to try my hand at other stuff. The popping sound the jars make when cooling after they have been processed in the water bath is delightful! I’m now wishing I had more fruit trees on my property.
The best part, though, was spending so much time with Dad. We became Team Jam. We were learning something new together and it was fun. Thankfully, Ian and Mom took care of the kiddos, kept them from drowning, and fed us all dinner.
I’ve been making an effort to do more in the kitchen, making dinners and cookies with the kids. Snow (8) came over after school the other day and together we made chocolate walnut cookies for fun. Last night’s dinner was mahi-mahi with balsamic vinegar sauce, sautéed bok choy, and cayenned sweet potato wedges, with those yummy chocolate walnut cookies for dessert. It was so pretty! White and green and orange.
Trying new recipes from our CSA this summer has been great fun. I tell ya, I love our Food Christmas Thursdays (two per month), when the big box of organic produce arrives on our front porch. I don’t know what’s in the box until I open it up! Seeing all those gorgeous fruits and vegetables in my delivery makes me feel life is beautiful and bountiful.
September 19, 2008 at 3:44 pm
That sounds simply scrumptious & like it was a WONDERFUL time with your Daddy. <3