Kitchen Jam

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I went simple, and old school, this month for Tigress’s CanJam, where the secret ingredients were rhubarb and asparagus. The local asparagus isn’t ready yet, but the rhubarb is – and although mangoes aren’t local to central NY, they are in season, cheap and fragrant. So here goes:

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My mango jam recipe is very simple – mango, water, a bit of sugar, a splash of vanilla.

For this month’s secret ingredient – herbs – I changed things up a bit in my basic recipe. I’m not completely happy with the balance in my current proportions, but if mangoes stay this inexpensive (right now, they’re four mangoes for $5), I’ll be doing more experiments making this recipe again to get it right. Read the rest of this entry »

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I missed the deadline for posting a recipe for Tigress’s April Can Jam.

The secret ingredient – herbs – really got me thinking. We’re in a tempting phase right now…chives and lemon balm are up, but the rest of the garden herbs aren’t even showing themselves yet. I was going to have to reach deep into my freezer (I have a huge batch of frozen thyme) or into my dried herbs (pretty much all I have left from last year’s harvest is sage.)

And the fruit that was tempting me this month was decidedly NOT local – ripe mangoes have been sending hints of tropical times, soft scents of warm places that just cried out to me from their display in the fresh produce section at Wegmans. And I mean – seriously – organic mangoes were 4 for $5. Bananas, oranges and cabbage are the only produce cheaper at this time of year.

So I bought a bunch of fresh (imported from some Canadian greenhouse) organic dill, which is perfuming my kitchen counter as I speak. And I caved and bought two perfectly ripe fragrant mangoes. And a lime. Because I knew what I wanted to do – dilled mango jam. Or salsa, maybe, or a mustard or a chutney. But I knew those tastes – mango, lime and dill - would work together.

And then work happened. And each night since Tuesday my mangoes have gotten more ripe, my dill more fragrant - while I came home, ex’d dogs and crashed.

So, I’m sorry Tigress, but I missed the deadline for the herbs CanJam.

But I will post the recipe here, and I promise it will be brilliant. I’ll probably make it this afternoon – if I don’t crash again and take a nap in the sunny warm afternoon living room.

Now…back to burning my candles at both ends.

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Do you ever think about tastes in your head, combine foods in your imagination, just know that different foods will mix perfectly into a wonderful unique taste?

That’s what happened to me when I was researching recipes for this month’s CanJam, part of the Tigress’s year-round canning challenge. March’s Iron Jam ingredient is alliums – and while even the ramps and green onions and chives aren’t quite in season here in central New York, the onions and garlic from last fall have wintered over nicely. This morning’s farmer’s market was filled with tables full of onions and garlic mixed in among the root vegetables. Read the rest of this entry »

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March’s CanJam ingredient – alliums – is a serious challenge. Although I’ve got a pretty good recipe for Red Onion Marmalade, I wanted to try something a bit different.

It’s not local (unless it can grow under snow?) but beautiful ruby-colored stalks of rhubarb have been showing up in the produce section for a couple weeks. So I’ve got a cup of rhubarb ‘coins’ (finely diced rhubarb) macerating in two tablespoons of organic brown sugar for the first microbatch of March jam. I’m counting on the rhubarb to bring its high-acid to a party of red onions slowly cooked in blood orange juice and spices. I’m going for a brilliant red onion-rhubarb jam with a hit or orange.

Stay tuned.