The asparagus season is in full swing. 14 of the 15 crowns planted in my newly prepared asparagus bed have started to appear, sending up very fine spears that then become frothy graceful ferns. They must be left alone for the time being to build up energy and form good sound crowns for the years ahead and I must be patient. I’m hoping the 15th crown is OK and wonder if I could have planted it upside down, and if I did, will it find its way right way up in time?
The other day I came across some bargain priced asparagus at the supermarket that had reached its sell by date, so was going cheap, half price in fact. Recognising a bargain when I see one, I bought up the lot so I could do some pickling. Since the Canjam last year, when other canners participating produced pickled asparagus, I’ve been wanting to experience this preserve first hand, but with this prized vegetable never exactly in abundant supply and always required for immediate scoffing, I couldn’t envisage when the opportunity to pickle some would arise. So watch what you wish for, here was my golden opportunity and I grabbed it with both hands.
I am now the proud owner of 5 x 500ml (1 pint) jars of pickled asparagus. I canned 3 to start with then had the idea to add the last of some wild garlic flowers, picked that day, so canned a couple more jars. I have no intention of sampling these pickles until the memory of the fresh English stuff is a distant memory, as this is not intended as a replacement for what is available in season right this minute. Some pickled spears, served with hard-boiled eggs, a handful of salad leaves and a wedge of homemade bread and butter will be a simple lunch to look forward too in 6 months time.

Fitting the spears into the jars is a wasteful business as they do need to be trimmed especially short to fit. I made asparagus soup with the stem cut-offs, so none went to waste, but shorter dumpier spears to start with makes the task less painful. There is no way I would have wanted to do this if I’d paid top wack for my ingredients.

PICKLING ASPARAGUS

I used 2 x 200g bundles of fresh asparagus spears to fill each 500ml (1 pint) jar, but it will depend how long the stems are and how much stem you’ll need to chop off so they fit into the jars. Allow a few more spears so they can be packed tightly into the jars and cut them so they fit snuggly and sit below the level of vinegar headspace when packed upright in the jars.

For each 500ml (1 pint) jar allow:

400g (1/2 lb) asparagus spears
120ml (1/2 cup) white wine vinegar
120ml (1/2 cup) water
1 tsp dill seed
1/4 tsp chilli flakes
1 tsp sea salt
1 small shallot, finely sliced
1/2 clove garlic, sliced
6 fresh wild garlic flowers (optional)

*Prepare the canning bath and keep your empty jars submerged in there until they are needed. Prepare lids in another pan of simmering water. Blanch the asparagus spears fleetingly in boiling water for 60 seconds, then drain them and cool immediately with cold water, so they don’t cook any further. Mix the vinegar and water in a pan and bring to a simmer.
Place the salt and spices in each jar, then pack the asparagus spears upright (or you can do them pointing down if you like!) in the jars, adding the shreds of shallot and garlic, and the wild garlic flowerheads in amongst them as you go. Pour in the vinegar/water to cover the asparagus, leaving the headroom necessary for your type of jar. De-bubble, to release any trapped air pockets surrounding the spears, using a chop stick or thin spatula. Wipe the jar rims clean and seal. Process for 10 minutes, then remove from the canner and leave until cold before testing the seals.

*Once canned like this your pickled asparagus will keep for a year or even longer. Pickling can be done successfully without hot water processing so long as the acidity of the vinegar / water used is high enough. Canning removes the guesswork!

Month twelve, the very last Tigress’s can jam canning challenge and for December the ingredient chosen by the wonderous Tigress herself, who set the whole ball rolling in the first place, is dried fruits in all their jewelled and seasonal glory. Must admit, apart from chutneys, don’t think I’ve ever used dried fruits in my preserves so this is new for me.
Yet again Fancy Pantry by Helen Witty, my all time favourite book, provided the inspiration. Her dried apricot & amaretto conserve sounded just perfect to meet the criteria of this months challenge, though I’m not a fan of adding alcohol to my jams. Well I say I’m not, that should be, I wasn’t. Over the last year I have discovered how a little splash of kirsch takes sour cherries from quite nice to amazing. Likewise a spoonful of calvados added to apple butter, or some Cointreau poured over squashed plums can take mundane to magnificent, adding something not necessarily consciously alcoholic but that somehow completes the balance of flavours in a wonderful way.
This did mean I had to shell out for a bottle of Amaretto, the down side of acquiring a stock of liqueurs, they don’t come cheap. Thankfully, this jam turned out even better than expected, really special in fact, so now I’ve got plenty of the ingredients left to make more of the same to give as presents. I added fresh cranberries to my jam which are great not only for their flavour and seasonality but for the lovely colour they bring. After I’d made the jam and started to think what it would go well with, ‘warm croissants’ absolutely shouted out to me.

I have opted for bright orange sulphured apricots over the darker unsulphured variety for my jam because I can’t bear the thought of starting out with dark brown fruit. It doesn’t bode well in my mind, brown fruit can only get doomier as it cooks, and for a special holiday preserve you want to push the boat out a bit. This preserve could take even less sugar that I used. I did a sugar test on it using a refractrometer and found that it contained 57%. For a preserve to store well without canning, it should be nearer to 65%, so if you aren’t into canning and want to be sure this jam will store in the pantry for any length of time without worrying it will go mouldy, I’d advise you to up the sugar content from 450g to 600g, but taste wise it doesn’t benefit from it. The added alcohol will also help to act as a preservative. This jam tastes so good it most likely wont hang around long enough anyway. If you are not into canning, this should make it obvious why canning is so brilliant. You can preserve using less sugar so the overriding flavour of your jam is the fruit it contains, not sugar. Preaching over, here’s the recipe.

APRICOT, CRANBERRY AND AMARETTO JAM

Makes approx 1.4Kg (3 lbs) jam

225g (8oz) dried apricots
150g (5 1/2oz) golden sultanas or raisins
0.90 ltr (3 1/2 cups) water
225g (8oz) fresh cranberries
1 1/2 tsp grated orange zest
0.25ltr (1 cup) freshly squeezed orange juice
2Tbs freshly squeezed lemon juice
450g (3 cups) sugar
3Tbsp Amaretto liqueur

Chop the apricots into small evenly-shaped pieces. Place them in a bowl with the sultanas and pour over 0.75ltr (3 cups) water. Leave to soak overnight.
Next day, prepare the water bath, jars and seals ready for canning. For more info about how to hot water process, refer to the guide here. Place the cranberries in a pan with the remaining water and simmer gently for 15-20 minutes until the fruits have popped and are cooked through. Leave to cool slightly, then add all of the remaining ingredients (including soaking liquid) except the Amaretto.
Stir to dissolve the sugar and once it has, turn up the heat to a rolling boil and bring the jam to setting point (took me about 10-15 minutes), that is when a dollop on a cold plate readily forms a skin that wrinkles when you push your finger over the surface. Remove from the heat and leave to cool for a few minutes then stir in the Amaretto. Pour into hot sterilised jars, seal and process for 10 minutes. Remove from the water bath and leave till completely cold before testing the seals and labelling.

IT’S A WRAP

Well that’s it. A whole year of the Tigresscanjam completed and wow, it has been amazing. I intend to write another post soon to round up what I’ve learnt and how it has changed my approach to preserving. Thanks to dearest Tigress for taking the time to not only oversee the challenge and the monthly roundups but for asking me to take part. To think that this experience could have passed me by …. well what can I say, how foolish I would have been without that gentle nudge.
I have found all you other canjammers participating truly inspiring. Thanks to all of you for helping me learn so much. As well as introducing me to Meyer lemons, Concorde grapes and Seckel pears, ingredients I will no doubt spend the rest of my life trying to experience first hand, amongst other things, too many to mention here, I’ve got over a few hangups I had about American-isms (and Canadian-isms if there is such a thing) such as ‘canning’. We are of course divided by a common language and as the only Brit taking part, I hope that you’ve likewise picked up some of the flavour of our approach to ‘bottling’ here in the UK. – Love G x

Each month when the Tigress’s can jam canning challenge ingredient has been announced, I’ve been relieved that it wasn’t up to me to choose. Being the only Brit taking part, it seemed such a massive responsibility to come up with a seasonal ingredient that would somehow accommodate all canjammers, travel half way around the world and fit into everyones canning calendar. Then the other day Tigress emailed me to say it was my shot and for a moment I was filled with dread. I say a moment, and it really was just a moment, as if by divine suggestion, the word ‘cucurbits’ fell from the sky and landed right on my head. The Tigress’ Can Jam ingredient for July is cucurbits, but it’s cucurbits with a proviso (see below).

In case you aren’t familiar with the term cucurbits, it refers to Cucurbitaceae, a plant family commonly known as melons and gourds, including crops like cucumbers, squashes (including pumpkins), loofahs, melons and watermelons…. So what’s the proviso? First let’s dispense with the loofahs! (too chewy), secondly, pumpkins and winter squashes, they’re out. It is most likely too early for them anyways but also they are troublesome ingredients to deal with for hot water processing and I aint taking responsibility for that.
So that leaves cucumbers, a traditional pickling favourite and one I want to learn lots about from you experts over in the US. (By the way, as far as I’m concerned, bread and butter pickle should actually contain what it says on the jar. Likewise ‘coffee cake’ Anyhow, I digress…) Summer squashes such as courgettes and marrows… ha… gotcha! Of course this is yet another strange difference in the language we share. To all you canjammers in the US, small zucchini and zucchini. I have Sarah at Toronto Tasting Notes to thank for help translating here. And finally, to bring a luscious sweetness to the proceedings, melons of all types.

I’m hoping this group of ingredients is specific enough to make sense as well as being wide enough to cater for everyone. I am finding that Tigress’ Can Jam is giving me the opportunity to try new ingredients I’ve never worked with before, as well as making me approach familiar ingredients in new ways or ways I hadn’t got round to trying. I think these cucurbits offer scope for all manner of pickles, chutneys, relishes and jams and I can’t wait to see what everyone comes up with, as six months in, the canning done so far has been a total revelation. As previously mentioned, I want to learn how to can my cucumbers like I’m in that Little House on the Praire. Marrows, zucchini to most of you, I’ve always considered a waste of everybodies time, but I’m now ready to reconsider. There are endless recipes for marrow chutneys and jams and as this vegetable is effortless to grow, I really think it is time to learn to love this clod-hopping monster of a gourd.

Courgettes, or small zucchini, are one of those glut kitchen ingredients that there are never enough uses for to reduce the surplus mountain, so it will be fabulous if some of you could come up with some essential recipes that the rest of us can’t live without.
And then there are the melons…. they fill me with such romantic notions; from the pickled watermelon rinds I’ve read of and dreamed about tasting, the spicy syruppy concoctions that might be sweet and sour at the same time, and finally, French inspired preserves, combining melon with lemon, or ginger, or raspberries, or peaches, that transport you to a village in Provence. Are you getting the gist?

I hope you feel inspired to go off and make cucurbits your own. I can’t wait to see what you come up with. If you need to refer to Tigress’ canning guide you will find it here. All recipes must be posted between friday july 16 and friday july 23rd, with friday july 23rd at midnight being the cut off point. Tigress has allowed two extra days at the beginning this month so if you are so inclined and you can get your post up on the earlier days, please do! as it will help her to get a head start on the round-up. (Bravo Tigress for all your work).

Month five Tigress’s can jam canning challenge and for May there are two ingredients to choose from; asparagus and rhubarb. Asparagus is still quite hard to come by locally. I found some in the Co-op but as it has come all the way from Peru I decided to give it a miss. I have a hard and fast rule to only buy English asparagus, which therefore means I only buy it during the 6-8 weeks that it is in season. I did buy an organic bundle in the deli here at Taurus Crafts, where my shop is situated, but it was quite expensive, so there was no way I would be prepared to mess about with such a prized ingredient other than to devour it chargrilled for my supper. So that leaves rhubarb, a crop I have already been working with for the last two and a half months but that is such a favourite of mine that I have yet to tire of it.
As luck will have it, whilst driving through the Forest of Dean I happened upon someone selling rhubarb at a very reasonable price from his smallholding. This place is a real find and I know that I will go back there often from now on, as he grows a great selection of soft fruits which will be really useful for preserving as the summer unfolds. I stupidly didn’t ask the man’s name, but will be sure too on my next visit. When I parked up and knocked on his door, my rhubarb was yet to be picked, so I knew it was as fresh as could be when the generous bundle was handed to me for a snip. Rhubarb is a strange crop. It grows really easily and can be seen in abundance in local allotments and gardens, but it is hard to find for sale and supermarkets rarely sell it. Tesco stock it most of the time but don’t always source British never mind locally. I saw it for sale earlier in the year shipped from New Zealand, which seems extraordinary when there are varieties in the UK which can grow almost all year round. So as I drove back home, with my canjam ingredient on the seat beside me, what was left to decide was what to make next.

I have already made a rhubarb marmalade, a rhubarb jam and a rhubarb cordial this year, so in the quest for something different I have decided to opt this time for a ketchup. Chutneys, sauces, relishes and ketchups are all kind of similar, except that they vary in texture and consistency. I fancied a ketchup that was smooth, with no recognisable pieces or chunks. I thought that if I kept the ingredients pale; white sugar, golden sultanas etc, I might just get away with a pinkish looking result. It wasn’t to be, as it cooked down it did take on a pinkish hue but of a beige variety. At that point I had to decide whether to stick with boring unattractive beige or whether to make the colour deeper and richer. I opted for the latter and added some balsamic vinegar. This has only a slight impact on the eventual taste of the ketchup so may seem a rather superficial consideration, but for me the downside of my ketchup is that what I have ended up with is brown. Brown, brown, brown. One of the most wonderful qualities rhubarb posesses is its colour. What a blunder, I should have made a beautiful clear rhubarb jelly instead to add to my already groaning rhubarb preserve mountain. However, now I’ve come to terms with the lack lustre appearance, the taste is making up for it. A sort of wolf in sheeps clothing scenario. I’m beginning to fantasise about dolloping ketchup on bubble and squeak, as a relish on a Double Gloucester sandwich or even with yoghurt and extra virgin rapeseed oil to dress some homegrown salad leaves. It may be brown but it is a winner all the same.

A while back I had an email from someone in the US who had bought my book. She said she was going to return the book to the shop the following day, accusing me of being ‘cavalier with ginger’. Amongst my friends, since then, this phrase has often been repeated and never fails to give us a laugh. My rhubarb ketchup is unashamedly cavalier with ginger, as rhubarb and ginger make such fine bed fellows. Obviously, if you aren’t a ginger fan, then tone it down to suit your taste. As usual when making chutneys, relishes and ketchups, that all contain vinegar, they do need a maturing phase to mellow the sharpness. This ketchup is surprisingly tasty straight away as I added some honey at the end which just takes the top edge off any harshness, but if you leave it for 3-6 weeks before opening you will find it well worth the wait. The result is fruity, spicy and I’m convinced it will be very versatile. I am not sure whether a strong enough ‘rhubarb’ vibe comes through yet, more of a lovely but general ‘fruity’ one, but I’ll see what it is like in a month or two and report back then. It is certainly worth making if you have rhubarb to spare that you hate to waste.

CAVALIER GINGER AND RHUBARB KETCHUP

Makes approx 1.6Kg (3 1/2 lbs)

1Kg (2lbs) chopped rhubarb
300g (10oz) onion (approx 3 med onions), chopped
325g (12oz) white sugar
1 Tbsp sea salt
600ml (1 pt) white wine vinegar
80ml (1/2 cup) balsamic vinegar
300g (10oz) raisins or sultanas
4 garlic cloves (approx 10g) peeled
4 knobs of ginger (approx 30g) peeled
2 tsp mustard seed
1 tsp allspice, ground
1tsp ground coriander
2 small dried chillis, crumbled
1/4 tsp cinnamon, ground
1/4 tsp cloves, ground
1 Tbsp honey

Place the rhubarb, onions sugar and sea salt in a non reactive preserving pan. Place the garlic, ginger, raisins (or sultanas) and vinegar in a food processor and pulse it to roughly chop everything together and break up the dried fruit. Add to the preserving pan along with the ground spices. Place the whole spices in a pestle and mortar and crush them roughly, then tip them into a piece of butter muslin, tie up in a parcel with string to secure and add to the pan.

Bring to a simmer and cook until the fruit is soft, the onions are transparent and the consistency is beginning to thicken. Remove the spice bundle and push the contents of the pan through a sieve or use a food mill with a fine mesh, collecting the resulting smooth mixture. (This part of the job took rather longer than I’d have liked. Next time I will probably wizz the mixture in a blender or food processor first so it passes through the sieve faster.) Return to the pan.
Prepare the water bath, jars and seals ready for canning. For more info about how to hot water process, refer to the guide here. Add the honey to the mixture and stir. Bring the contents of the pan to a simmer and cook further if necessary until the ketchup is of a suitable consistency, like tomato ketchup. Pour into the jars leaving required headroom, seal and hot water process for 10 minutes. Remove the jars from the water bath and leave them till completely cold before testing the seals. Label and store. Leave the ketchup for at least 3 weeks before using. Without water processing the ketchup will still keep for several months unopened.

Month three Tigress’s can jam canning challenge and the chosen ingredient covers a multitude of choices, as anything classed as an allium fits the bill. I intended to post about pickled wild garlic but with the deadline looming and this post ready to roll, I’m running with pickled onions instead. The wild garlic, almost completed, will follow after.
I’m really more of a jam and chutney person but the Tigresscanjam challenge is giving me reasons to explore things I want to know more about. Pickles aren’t something I’ve developed much of a taste for and I hadn’t thought that they figured much in my upbringing. Then I remembered an onion and vinegar condiment, served at my grandparents house when I was little, as an accompaniment to Lancashire hotpot. It was made very simply of chopped raw onions marinated in malt vinegar, simple as. Never a great meat eater, I recall especially looking forward to this onion relish, eaten with the delicious sliced potatoes that were part of the hotpot.
My cousin Jackie, an ex-Blackpool landlady who can rustle up a mean Lancashire hotpot, told me that this onion relish is the traditional companion to this regional speciality along with pickled red cabbage. Though I have no recollection of ever being served pickled cabbage as a kid, knowing this makes me pleased that pickling is part of my own heritage too, something I’d managed to forget about until the canjam challenge got me thinking. Then last week I found this onion-shaped Weck preserving jar in a charity shop, so filling it with pickled onions seemed perfectly appropriate.

Pickling has to be one of the easiest things ever. I’ve chosen to make a sweet pickling vinegar using traditional malt vinegar with added brown sugar, honey plus a few spices. Pickling vinegars are really delicious and give plenty of scope for experimentation. Any leftover vinegar can be turned into salad dressings or be drizzled on your chips. The shallots need to be salted at the beginning to draw out excess liquid, which will help the onions to retain their crunch. I have hot water processed my jar of pickles to meet the criteria of the challenge, give myself more practice at canning and to use the jar in the way it was intended, but pickled onions are a pretty safe bet without that palaver. The processing makes them extra safe.

SWEET PICKLED ONIONS

Fills a litre (quart) sized jar

750g (1 1/2lbs) shallots
50g (2oz) salt
.5ltr (1pint) malt vinegar
100g (4oz) soft brown sugar
100g (4oz) honey
1 tsp peppercorns
1 dried red chilli
1/2 tsp mustard seeds
5cm (2in) piece of cinnamon stick
2cm (1in) cube of fresh ginger sliced

Pour boiling water over the shallots, leave them for a few minutes, then drain and rinse with cold water. Remove the skins and place in a glass bowl, sprinkling the salt in layers over them. Leave overnight, then rinse and drain them before packing into the hot sterilised jar.
Place the vinegar and the remaining ingredients in a pan, stir over a medium heat to dissolve the sugar and honey, then bring to the boil. Pour over the onions to cover, pushing the chilli and cinnamon stick between the shallots on the outside of the jar, leaving 1 – 2cm (1/2 – 3/4in) headspace. Seal with the lid and process for 15 minutes in a hot water bath. For more info about how to hot water process, refer to the guide here. You could use 2 500ml (1 pint) sized jars instead, in which case you only need to process them for 10 minutes. Once cooled store the pickled onions for 4-8 weeks before eating.

Month two, Tigress’s can jam canning challenge, and the ingredient to grapple with is ‘carrots’. They aren’t in season in the UK, not as a freshly pulled from the ground seasonal veg at any rate, otherwise I would have found some of those trendy purple ones to work with, or a nice bunch with their greenery attached that would have made a lovely picture tied in a bundle with garden twine. So a brown paper bagful of locally-grown and stored organic specimens is my starting point.

There is one good thing about it, I’ve learnt a lot since ‘carrots’ was announced. I wanted to find a recipe suitable for canning that needs carrots instead of just includes them, so I trawled through my extensive collection of books on preserving. I felt sure I would unearth a war time gem, thinking carrots would have been used more as a sweetener in times when sugar was scarce, but nothing turned up. I didn’t want to simply bottle carrots for the sake of it, couldn’t find a suitable pickle recipe, was about to adapt a Madhur Jaffrey recipe for quince and lemon chutney (by adding carrots) then forgot and cooked my last quinces. I was tempted by my trusted and much loved ‘Let’s Preserve It’ by Beryl Wood, a little jewel of a paperback from 1970 which contains 579! recipes, including a carrot chutney, a jam, 2 marmalades as well as a recipe for spiced carrots. but eventually settled on combining carrots with rhubarb in a jam.

British forced rhubarb is just starting to appear for sale. The season for forced rhubarb, grown in the ‘Yorkshire triangle’ begins January through to April, when field grown takes over. My head has been full of rhubarb all month as I am sorting out which varieties to plant on my allotment. Rhubarb alone is fantastic, so I just hoped that the inclusion of carrots in the recipe would be a wonderful addition rather than just meeting the canjam deadline. I’ve also added some chopped stem ginger and candied peel as I have some candied melon slices left over from baking at Christmas, so it has been a good opportunity to use some up. I recommend you use good quality candied peel for this, usually sold in chunky pieces from a deli or health food shop, rather than that ready chopped stuff in tubs surrounded by gloopy syrup you find in supermarkets.

I did have to watch that the jam didn’t burn whilst I was boiling it to a set. As it cooked it turned to a beautiful deep orangy-red gelatinous consistency but it spat as it boiled. As both carrots and rhubarb are lacking in pectin, it is probably advisable to use jam sugar with pectin added or add extra pectin if you want a good set. I used half ordinary white sugar and half jam sugar, because I had some needed using up. What I have ended up with is quite a soft set but the taste is amazingly good. The recipe uses enough carrots to be ‘useful’ from the ‘using up a glut’ perspective and the jam isn’t overly sweet, so it makes perfect sense for canning. It would be ideal as a filling for jam tarts or Tigress’s thumbprint cookies or to fill a larger pastry case with the addition of an egg beaten into it then baked in the oven to set. A slice served with cream or mascarpone flavoured lightly with some ginger syrup from the stem ginger jar would work perfectly. All in all, it has been an unexpected success.

CARROT & RHUBARB JAM

Makes approx 1.5Kg (3lbs 5oz)

500g (1lb 2oz) carrots, peeled, topped and tailed
500g (1lb 2oz) rhubarb, washed and trimmed
1 unwaxed lemon
800g (1 3/4lbs) sugar (use jam sugar with added pectin for a stronger set)
60g (2oz) stem ginger (approx 4 balls)
150g (5oz) candied peel (any citrus or melon will do)

Finely grate the carrots and place in a pan with 500ml (3/4pt) of water. Finely grate the zest from the lemon, squeeze out the juice and place to one side. Chop the lemon halves, pith and all, into chunks and place them and any pips in a muslin bag tied closed with string or a knot and add them to the carrots. Bring to a simmer and cook with the lid on for 20 minutes, then remove from the heat.

Chop the rhubarb into 1cm (1/2in) sized cube pieces. If the sticks are thick I slice them lengthways once or sometimes twice before chopping into equally sized small chunks. Place the rhubarb in a bowl, add the lemon zest and juice and pour the sugar over it. Cover and leave for an hour or two until the juice starts to run from the rhubarb.
Tip the contents of the rhubarb bowl into a preserving pan and add the cooked carrots, cooking liquid and muslin bundle. Add the finely chopped stem ginger and candied peel cut into thin slivers. Heat slowly, stirring all the time until the sugar is completely dissolved, then turn up the heat bring to a rolling boil and cook until setting point is reached (this took me around 25 minutes). (Test for a set on a cold plate or use a jam thermometer.) Discard the muslin bag.
Pour into hot sterilised jars, leaving 1 – 2cm (1/2 – 3/4in) headspace, screw on the lids to fingertip tight and process for 10 minutes in a hot water bath. For more info about how to hot water process your preserves, refer to the guide here. Leave your jars until cold and don’t forget to label and date them.

When I was a kid, my friends aunt, who was some sort of food scientist, told me that if you looked at an apple with a bad patch on it, under a microscope, you would see that the badness goes far beyond the brown bit, like spreading mycelium or the roots of a plant. This information was told as a warning, to not think it enough to just cut away the bad part and eat the rest, as what lurks beneath unseen might kill you! As I say, I am recalling a childhood memory here to dramatic effect.
Needless to say, I have always remembered this advice yet always chosen to ignore it. I was brought up to be made of sterner stuff. I follow a scale of food offness of my own design and ‘it hasn’t done me any harm’. I know that there are others whose standards in this regard are much higher than mine and just in case you are by now doubting my credentials and casting aspersions on my forthcoming artisan preserve venture, I do have an official food hygiene certificate.
For 2010, I, along with around 130 others, am taking part in Tigress’ Can Jam Challenge, an idea devised by fellow US based blogger tigressinajam, (see also tigressinapickle). The idea, to choose a different seasonal ingredient each month that can be canned. You can read the challenge outline here. It is all about ‘canning’. In the UK we don’t ‘can’ anyway, we ‘bottle’ and even that is a niche activity. Bottling, in case you don’t know, is a way of preserving food in special glass jars by employing either a hot water bath on the cooker hob or an oven method so the foodstuff is rendered sterile and will thus store in your larder for ever more. Bottling was once popular in the UK, especially during the wartime ‘make do and mend’ era. It went right out of fashion with the advent of the freezer but now seems to be making a come back with the move back to home grown fruit and veg and other eco considerations. As I am keen to know all about it, even though I am generally of the ‘scrape any mould off the top then eat the jam beneath’ school of thought, I intend to embrace the challenge and run with it.
As regular readers will already know, I am a passionate jam, chutney and pickle maker, all activities which in the US seem to come under the canning umbrella but that here somehow don’t. Basically putting your preserves through this canning process will make doubly certain that they will keep and not become contaminated. Canning requires the use of special Kilner jars (or Mason Ball jars in the US) which need new seals every time you use them. These traditional style jars, invented in 1842, have recently been reintroduced and I sell them in my shop. Unlike in the US, you can’t buy complete canning kits here with all the bits and bobs you need to get started, but you can buy some of the equipment, the rest you have to improvise. Anyhow, as the year unfolds I will be able to write about what I discover.
In order to meet the criteria of the challenge, it does mean that any preserves I make must be processed in a hot water bath, or at least I must say they are! Have you lot in the States not heard of the cellophane circle and elastic band method of sealing your jam?
January has a citrus theme. It must be wonderful to pick your ingredient straight from the tree, as some of the other challenge participants are able to do. I had to buy my fruit as none is grown here. Here is my first recipe for the 2010 Tigress’ Can Jam Challenge.

LEMON, FIG & LAVENDER MARMALADE
I am a massive fan of traditional bitter seville orange marmalade and this marmalade is just as tangy and fabulous. The lavender note adds an unusual flavour but isn’t at all over powering or over flowery. A few words first on ingredients; choose lemons that are organic where possible and unwaxed always, for this preserve. I had trouble finding dried figs without a load of gloop surrounding them, as they seem to be sold like this in supermarkets for ready-eating. Eventually I found some really nice dried Lerida figs in the health food shop. Dried lavender can vary a lot. I sell Snowshill lavender, grown in Worcestershire, sold by the scoopful in my shop and it is highly scented and natural. If you can’t find one with a good fresh scent, then please just leave it out; if you use it, it wont bring anything useful to the party.

Makes 1.3kg (3lb)

5 unwaxed lemons, approx 600g (1lb 5oz) plus 1 other lemon
400g (14oz) dried figs
25g (1oz) dried lavender
1kg (2lbs 4oz) sugar

Heat the oven to 180C/ 350F/ Mk 4. Wash the 5 lemons and place in a lidded heat-proof casserole with 650ml (1 1/8pts) water, so the fruits just begin to float. Bring to a simmer, put the lid on and place in the oven to slow cook for 2 1/2 to 3 hours.
Remove the stalks from the figs and chop them into 1cm (3/8in) sized pieces (or smaller or bigger as you like, remembering they swell up as they reconstitute). Place in a preserving pan with 650ml (1 1/8pts) of water and leave them to soak while the lemons are poaching.
Remove the casserole from the oven and lift the lemons carefully with a slotted spoon out of the liquid into a sieve placed over a bowl to catch any drips. Leave them till cool enough to handle then cut each lemon in half and scoop out all the innards, collecting all the pulp and pips in a piece of muslin. Tie the muslin into a bundle and add to the preserving pan along with the poaching liquid and any liquid collected in the bowl. Chop the lemon skins finely into strips and keep on one side. Tie the dried lavender in another piece of muslin to make a bundle and add that also to the pan. Bring to the boil and simmer for 20 minutes.

Take off the heat. Remove the pulp and pip bundle and add the chopped lemon peel as well as the juice from the remaining lemon, passing it through a sieve to remove any pips if necessary. Add the warmed sugar and stir until completely dissolved then heat, bringing the pans contents to a rolling boil and test for a set after about 10 minutes and every 3-5minutes after that until setting point is reached. If you haven’t ever done this before this means that a blob of the syrup on a cold plate will readily form a skin that wrinkles when you push your finger across it. Take the pan off the heat whilst testing.
Turn off the heat, remove the lavender bundle and leave the jam to rest for 15 minutes then stir to distribute the pieces evenly before pouring into hot, clean, sterilised jars. Seal with either waxed paper discs and jam pot lids or the bottle seals and screw tops if intending to hot water process, in which case place the jars in the water bath and process for 10 minutes. For more info about how to hot water process your preserves, refer to the guide here. Leave your jars until cold and don’t forget to label and date them.