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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Image via Wikipedia

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.