Proctor Hill Berries

The place I used to go horseback riding is called Proctor Hill. I was given permission to forage there; there were nettles but, mostly, there were berries. All sorts of berries. Over the years, I foraged wee little amounts of black raspberries, red raspberries, wild blueberries, a handful of blackberries, and wild grapes. These were tucked into the freezer, waiting until I had enough of them. I had always intended to make a mixed berry jam or jelly as a gift for my riding instructor. 

Time has marched on and my instructor has left that farm for a place that better suited her current needs. I haven't ridden for over a year, after a spectacular fall made me question whether I wanted to continue. I was just getting ready to consider Western pleasure riding instead when the pandemic effectively made the decision for me. At least, for now. I do miss it; spending an hour or so a week without a cell phone in sight, only focused upon the immediate challenge of convincing a very large living and opinionated creature to do what I wanted. It got me out of my head in a way that nothing else seems to do. 

In the process of moving out and then back in to a freezer, I found all those berries. It was clear I was never going to add to the stash so it was time to make jelly out of what I had. The grapes are the dominant flavor but the raspberries do add something, I think. I cooked down the berries with water, extracted almost six cups of juice, let the solids settle, and then made jelly. Ultimately I ended up with about nine cups of jelly, enough for 12 small jars for my gift stash and a few extra just for us.

Random Berry Find

On Sunday, when I was walking home from the subway, I happened upon a small patch of black raspberry bushes.  These are not things I usually find in my area; blackberries are much more plentiful.  Some were ripe but a lot weren't.  So I waited a few days and yesterday I brought the kids down there and we picked 1.5 cups of tiny little black raspberries.  Last night we ate them for dessert, with a little sugar and cream.  Yum.

I also need to work through all the vegetables I've been getting - my mason dropped off some celery, a large zucchini, and swiss chard.  I took that zucchini and one I had from the farm and made 3 loaves of chocolate zucchini bread.  Tonight I'll get the farm share again and I plan to have a big stir fry with a lot of the veggies I currently have from last week:  snow peas, scallions and bok choy.  And I suspect there will be a salad as well.  Mocha seems to like chard better than bok choy so there's some help there!

This Might Be the One...

...to enter in the Fair!

Last year we went to the Topsfield Fair for the first time and I was particularly interested in the canning competition.  People at work have told me for years I should enter my jams.  I thought it might be fun to try it.  I wanted a jam that would make people melt with how good it tastes.  I think today's batch just might be it.

The black raspberries in Ohio were ripe when we were there last week so I enlisted the 11 y/o and my niece and we went early on Friday and picked about 5 pounds.  I set aside 2 quarts for jam, which I froze so I could bring them home, 1 quart for a cobbler, and the rest for eating.  The "rest" were eaten in less than a day.  Yum!  And the cobbler was fabulous.  I might have to make that instead of crisps from now on!

For the jam, I ran some of the berries through a sieve to get rid of the seeds and the rest I just mashed, added 1/4 cup lime juice, 6.5 cups of sugar and the pectin.  This made almost exactly 8 cups of jam, just as it was supposed to.  I have 6 8-ounce jars and 4 4-ounce jars as I've been working on the gift stash all spring.

And that taste, oh!  It makes me weak at the knees!

Black Raspberries

Two years ago, while visiting my in-laws, I had a challenging time making black raspberry jam in their kitchen. The problem was a lack of equipment and being unfamiliar with the dynamics of the kitchen (the work triangle, I guess. I learned about that while contemplating redoing my kitchen). Anyhow, I am either brave or foolish: I decided to try again.

But I can be taught. Before I got started, I bought a canning rack, jar grabber, and a funnel! I was prepared! This morning my father-in-law, my husband and I went out to pick black raspberries. We picked about 8 pounds, which is enough for two batches of jam and a bunch for eating. One batch was the standard Certo recipe (8 jars) and the other was the same recipe but with lime juice and lime zest (9 jars). I really like how the lime one turned out. It's a nice combination of flavors.

However: the canning rack fit none of their pots. So I bent it until the wire snapped and I was able to overlap the edges and get it into the pot. There were no major issues with the other equipment but I did still get jam all over the dish towel...

...and we have no plan to get these home. I don't think I can check them and I certainly can't carry them on. I may have to ship them...

Suburban Gleaning

We went to visit my parents in RI over the weekend. As we drove to their house, 2 lots away I noticed red berries growing in a vacant lot. As soon as I could I went over there, carrying a container (hopeful, aren't I?), to see if they were something good to eat. To my surprise, they were black raspberries! The unripe ones had caught my eye, but there was a good amount of the ripe ones for us all to share.

The next day, I convinced my father that I could do something with the plums growing on his (mostly decorative) plum trees. He doesn't spray them or anything, and 2 years ago we had harvested a bunch and I extracted the juice and a lot of unmentionable critters. I attempted to make jelly with that small amount of juice but it came out more like fruit leather, and that was the end of that. This year we put down a tarp and with 3 adults and the occasional help from the 5 year old, harvested a LOT of plums. These were then washed, and I sliced each and every one, only keeping the ones without any of those aforementioned critters. Even with throwing a lot away, I filled a big pot with plums and still had an entire large bowl full of plums (which I eventually tossed, there were just too many). After boiling, straining, adding more hot water, straining some more, I ended up with about 2 quarts of juice. That's a lot of juice! I want to make plum jelly but I am also hoping to use some of the juice to make a plum sauce or BBQ sauce, but all the recipes I'm finding are for the pulp, not the juice. Can anyone help?

Canning in Someone Else's House

If you're like me, you're very territorial about your kitchen. I have a hard time sharing. But by the same token, I have a hard time cooking in someone else's kitchen. I am willing to try, though. Today's saga is about making black raspberry jam in my in-laws' kitchen.

Morning time, cue the birds, the sunshine, and the over eager mother waking up her 7 year old with, "get up get up get up, there are berries out there!" "*Groan* Okay, okay..." We recruited my father-in-law and the 3 of us went to get black raspberries. (These don't grow around our place, therefore I HAD to can some.) We went out and spent a lovely morning picking, netting about 8 pounds of berries.After dropping the berries, the 7 year old, and the father-in-law back at the house, I went to the store and bought 2 flats of jars, Certo, and sugar. Now for the hard part - adapting to different equipment. My in-laws brought out a selection of very nice pots and I picked the 2 largest. No canning rack? Use the bands! Oh, wait, that won't work when I want to put the bands on the jars after filling them. Hmmm. Open the other flat. OK. But there are 14 jars to fill and only 12 bands not in the pot. Well, I'll worry about that later.

The jars are simmering, the jam is being made (used 1/2 of the berries to make a double batch of jam) and I'm looking around for something to use to get the jars in and out of the makeshift canner. I settle on a flat perforated metal thing, kinda like a spatula but round, and barbecue tongs.

Jam's done! I set the pot in the sink as this was the safest place for it. They have an electric stove so I couldn't just set a towel and jars down next to the canner on the stovetop. I fish all the jars out and use the flat metal thing to get the lids out of the pot, too. I vaguely wonder how the jars are going back in, since the bands have shifted, the tongs work best if you stick them into the jars, and it's all really, really hot. OK. Ready. Funnel?

No funnel. That's OK! I used to make jam without all this stuff! I can do it! I ladle some jam into the first jar. And down the outsides. Slow down, be more careful next time. I can do this.

I pour an entire ladleful of jam into...the dish towel.

Mad scramble ensues to clean up enough so the countertop doesn't stain...much. (Sorry!)

Somehow I manage to get all 14 jars filled. We even dug up a couple of extra bands so I could get them all closed. There was just a little left in the pot that could easily have been another jar, but 14 was all that would fit in the largest pot so I decided to just keep it in tupperware. Good thing, too. The next hurdle was getting all these jars back into the boiling water.

I put in 1, gingerly, using the tongs and the flat metal thing to support the bottom of the jar. Sat it perfectly overlapping 2 bands. Great! I put the second one in, still moving slowly. I turn to get the third. The first 2 fall over in the hot water. Aaah! I try to move faster. Ultimately I ended up with 6 jars stacked like fallen dominos in the water, and I just can't get them to stand upright because the bands scoot out from underneath. I know that if I can just cram them all in there, I can get them upright again. Now what? I'm wishing I was Krishna or something, with many arms.

Enter my father-in-law. He very helpfully used 2 more cooking utensils to push the jars upright while I quickly and carefully dropped a few more jars in. Finally, the pot was full and the jars were no longer falling over. Yay!

There was one jar left on the countertop.