Can Jam June: Cherry Spice Jelly

I'm too late for the Can Jam round-up, but I wanted to share my creation for the Can Jam challenge. It was inspired by my recent trip to the Spice Market in Seattle.

Cherry Spice Jelly

64 oz cherry juice

4 Tbs "Market Spice" loose tea

tea bag

1 pkg no sugar needed pectin

1 cup sugar

In a large saucepan bring cherry juice and tea to a boil. Remove tea bag, add pectin and return to a boil. Add sugar and return to a hard boil that can not be stirred down. Pour into prepared jars and process for 10 mins. in a boiling water bath canner.

What do you do when you have a 5 gallon bucket of frozen cherries?

Pit them.....

...................... and make jam!

In the pic above you can see a couple of my souvenirs from our trip to Washington. I like to buy milk in glass bottles while I'm on vacation and then bring the glass bottle home as a souvenir. They come in handy, holding homemade juices, broths and iced tea.

You can also see the tea I bought at the Public Market in Seattle at the Spice Market. It has cinnamon oil in it, which adds a sweet, but not sugary flavor to the jelly.

Putting the tea in a tea bag.

Cherry juice and tea bag.

Finished jelly.

It is very tart, but has a sweet cinnamon aftertaste. It tastes like the perfect essence of cherries.

Can Jam May - Rhubarb

Update 5-25-10 -Pictures! Yay! Posts are so much better with pictures!

Also, if you have extra rhubarb leaves I made a rhubarb stepping stone post here.

You may notice that there aren't any pictures in this post. That's because I am an idiot and I dropped and broke my camera. Argh! I had the worst week for canning. First of all I broke my camera, then I was about to start canning and I'd borrowed my Dad's camera, but then the whole town lost power for 4 hours. Then my Dad went on vacation and took his camera with him. I also had to get Tansy neutered - yes that's right my sweet little girl turned out to be a BOY! Let's just say Tansy is not pleased with me right now - the snip snip wasn't so much fun. I also had a really busy exhausting week at work. There were also a million things I had to plant in the garden. Plants don't exactly wait very well to get planted. Soooooooo a long difficult week.

~

This month for the Can Jam we had the choice of either rhubarb or asparagus. I HATE(d) both!

My hate for the green spears stems from my childhood. When you grow up in a family that grows asparagus for sale, you eat a lot of asparagus, and in my case develop a hatred of it. This is also why I am not a huge fan of red raspberries. I imagine the same thing happens to children of candy makers. *just kidding!*

~

So rhubarb. Well, my Mom never cooked with rhubarb when I was growing up, because she hated it. She hated all the sugar that people add to it. However, I turned her into a rhubarb lover with my Savory Rhubarb Soup recipe. I thought about making a rhubarb-cherry jam, but after experiencing the citric acid power of rhubarb in the soup recipe, I decided to try a savory recipe. My Mom was rooting for a chutney recipe, but I have lots of Pear Chutney in my pantry. I decided on a salsa recipe and so Rhubarb Salsa was born, er canned.

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Spicy Rhubarb Salsa

3 cups chopped tomatoes

2 cups chopped rhubarb

1 cup chopped tomatillos

1 cup chopped yellow onion

1/2 cup chopped chile peppers (I used a combination of habenero, yellow spicy and anaheim)

1 Tbs garlic paste

1/2 cup brown sugar

2 Tbs cilantro

2 Tbs cumin

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup vinegar

1/2 cup lime juice ( I used key limes)

Combine all ingredients in a large sauce pot. Bring mixture to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer 10 mins. Ladle hot sauce into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Adjust 2 piece caps. Process 15 mins. in a boiling water bath canner.

This is HOT!!!

It has a sweet and smokey flavor too.

It's yummy. I think it would make a good barbecue sauce.

Filled jars before canning.

Onions.

Peppers.



I thought the tomatillo husks looked like flowers.

Chopped peppers.

Rhubarb and tomatillo.

Tomato.

Cooking.

Cooking.

Canning.

Done!

Rhubarb salsa!

Can Jam April - Herbs: Blueberry-Mint Jam

When the April CanJam was announced as herbs, I wasn't very excited.

Herbs?

I want to start using things from my garden for the CanJams, but chives are the only herb growing out there right now. Sure I have a tsp. of a few other herbs that are starting to sprout up, but I didn't want to chop off their little baby heads.

I just did garlic-onion jam last CanJam, so I also didn't want to use the chives.

I still have a freezer full of blueberries from our berry picking vacation, so I knew that I wanted to use blueberries, but what herb goes with blueberries?

At first, I thought about Lavender. This Lavender? No the herb lavender!

I've heard of Blueberry-lavender jam, but my Mom suggested mint (Thanks Mom!).

Mint?

Really?

That's so weird - it just might work!
I just happened to have homemade mint extract in my freezer too. I made it last summer from the huge mint plant (bush) in my backyard. Sorry there aren't any pics of the mint extract process, I made it before I started taking pictures of everything.

So here it is:

Blueberry-Mint Jam

4 cups blueberries

2 cups mint extract (directions below)

1 Tbs bottled lemon juice

1 tsp butter

4 cups sugar

1 pkg no sugar needed pectin

Bring blueberries, mint extract, lemon juice and butter to a rolling boil. Boil for 10 mins and then add sugar. Return to a boil. Boil for 10 mins. Add pectin and return to a boil. Boil at a rolling boil for 1 min. Transfer to prepared jars and process in a boiling water bath canner for 10 mins.

To make mint extract: Take fresh mint leaves, remove the stems and measure the mint leaves. Put mint leaves in a bowl. Add boiling water to the bowl - if you have 2 cups mint leaves add one cup boiling water, if you have 1 cup mint leaves add 1/2 cup boiling water - you get the idea. Let mint leaves steep until cool or overnight in the fridge. Strain mint leaves from liquid and pour mint extract into ice cube trays. Freeze mint extract or skip the freezing and use in the recipe above.

Blueberries and mint extract

Boil!

Spoony likes the taste - yum!

With sugar and pectin.

In the jar.

Glossy

Spoony! Did you eat it all?!?

Nope. He saved a few jars.

Jars fresh from the canner.

I found a few mint sprigs in the garden and sacrificed them for this picture.

Poor plant babies.

So.................what does it taste like?!?

Yummy!

Fresh, clean, very blueberry-ish with a nice minty aftertaste, but not overpoweringly mint. In fact, if you didn't know there was mint in this jam I don't think you could pick out the flavor. It has an intriguing flavor, but like the Carrot Jam, no one would ever think blueberry-mint jam.

Oh, also this jam took me exactly 1 hour to make from start to cans sealing on the counter.

Can Jam March - Allium

The third Can Jam challenge of the year was allium.

I was happy, because I have lots of garlic left over from last year's garden .

I also had 2 Copra onions from last year's garden that I was saving for something special.

Something special like Onion Garlic Jam!

This is seriously good stuff.

When I'm cooking something and I really like it, this is what I say to myself, "Mmmm, oh yeah. This is some seriously good stuff. I'll just try a little more."

Onion Garlic Jam

4 cups cooked garlic/onion puree -For texture if desired, reserve 1 cup onions cooked, but unpureed
4 cups brown sugar

3 cups vinegar

2 Tbs salt

1 pkg no sugar needed pectin

Variety of home grown garlic.

Garlic bulbs ready for roasting in a 400F degree oven, drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with salt.



My 2 normal large sized onions and a JUMBO onion from the grocery store.
It was huge!

Slicing up a Copra onion. It is amazing how well these onions store through the winter. This onion is over 6 months old.

More onion slicing.

Cooking the onion slices with a little butter and salt.

The salt breaks the cell walls in the onions and helps them release more water.

Less water = more onion flavored jam.

Roasted garlic ready for pureeing.

All the ingredients in the pot ready to be boiled up.

Bring everything to a boil and then add pectin.

Return to a boil and continue cooking for 1 min at a rolling boil that can't be stirred down.

I cooked mine for about 5 mins at a rolling boil, because I wanted a very firm jam.

Pectin added - reboiling.

Pour into sterilized jars and adjust 2 piece tops.

Process in a boiling water bath canner for 15 mins.

This post to me a ridiculously long time to write, because I have a new fur baby distraction.

Tansy!

I also worked 7 out of the last 8 days..........my one day off? I made jam! LOL

Can Jam Feb. - Carrots #2

Torshi Haveej - Persian Carrot Pickle with Mint and Garlic

4 large carrots, shredded

6 radishes - thinly sliced

2 1/2 cups white vinegar

1 1/2 cups water

1 Tbs salt

1 Tbs sugar

1 tsp dried garlic cubes

1 mint tea bag

pinch red pepper flakes

Lightly pack 3 pint jars with shredded carrots and radishes. Bring brine ingredients to a boil. Pour brine into jars. Remove air bubbles. Process for 10 mins in a boil water bath canner.

Makes 3 pints

Shredded carrots and radishes.

Brine ingredients.

Filled jars.

This is a tasty carrot slaw. The mint and garlic add an unexpected dimension to the carrots.

Opposites really do attract.

Delicious!

Plus a pic from this summer. I found these 2 carrots in my garden. They were growing in a corner of a raised bed.