Mr Castle would be proud

For Christmas J was sent a book (complete with CD) of Margaret Mahy stories which included one of my favourites, Jam.

Source: amazon.com

It tells of Mr Castle, an extremely competent house-husband, who decides to make jam from the plums falling from their backyard tree.  The problem is that he refuses to waste a single plum and,consequently, every receptacle in the house is used to hold the jam.  They cheer when they can reclaim the teapot for tea, to go with their "scones, pancakes, roly polies and sponge cakes." And so they go on eating the jam.  I won't spoil the ending for you.

I have been enjoying reading and listening to the stories over the past month, especially Mahy's Kiwi accent! The excesses of Mr Castle's jam-making always seem to come to mind when I am midway through preserving a big batch of produce.  I'm sure the fruit multiplies when I am cleaning, trimming and chopping it; so it is gratifying to finally have it in jars, sitting in my pantry at the end (when it has usually returned to its former proportions)  Nevertheless, it is satisfying on many levels to consume.

My most recent session was making jam from nine pounds of strawberries (closer to 8.5 after we snacked on some.)  I ordered the fruit from our produce co-op and invited a friend to come over and help the next day.  We prepped 5 lbs of strawberries that afternoon, made 2 batches of jam, and I mixed up some to macerate in the fridge overnight.  Over the past week I made that lot up, and made two more batches with the remaining strawberries.  Phew!

I used the following recipes, with varying degrees of success, but they all taste great. I didn't buy new jars, just reused ones with rubber seals in the lids.  On the whole, my attempt to reuse baby food jars was NOT successful. So much for saving so many.  I'll be hunting on Pinterest for some other projects I think.

Plain Ol' Strawberry Jam: I did a half batch and then a whole batch.  I didn't bother processing the jam (Shock, horror! Call the food police!) but just cooked it until it was a soft setting consistency.  The total yield was 4 large [18oz?] jars.  Even the large jar that was still 2 inches below full had enough residual heat to create a vacuum and seal. Yay!

Strawberry and Ginger Jam:  A search for a recipe was prompted by a friend mentioning her German mother-in-law's amazing jam.  This yielded 1 large jar and 1 baby food jar.  The latter refused to seal so we have been sampling it.  I'll make it again.

The entire yield from 8.5lbs, minus 3 baby food jars consumed already.

Strawberry Basil Jam: I had bought some basil for another recipe and decided to use it up when I saw this mentioned.  As an experiment in water-bath canning I tried processing baby food jars in my largest pot, and this was my big fat failure!  Two jars came open while they were in the water bath, two made that satisfying 'pop' sound as the seals depressed but sadly they weren't sealed when I checked them the next morning.  Because they were being processed I didn't cook the fruit as long so the jam is more syrup than spreading consistency.  All 7 little Xs below are this yield and are now in our fridge.  The downside: I didn't have a deep enough pot to process a large jar so I only used the baby food jars.  The upside: strawberry basil syrup tastes great on pancakes!  I'll try this one again but cook until setting point is reached.

Strawberry, Ginger, Bay, Black Pepper and Lemon Jam: I made a half recipe with the last 2 lbs of strawberries. I didn't have quite enough black pepper (despite raiding our collection of little sachets that come with plastic cutlery on airplanes and the like) and I doubled the lemon zest.  This yielded 1 large jar and 1.5 baby food jars. Again the baby food jars didn't seal.  I think I'd like to make this again with more pepper.

 

All in all, a mountain of strawberries now in jars of deliciousness.  Mr Castle would be proud!