Joy in the Journey

We've had a very mild winter this year. We bought 4 new bags of ice-melt back at the beginning of the winter that are all still languishing in the garage!

And because of this mildness our apricot tree is popping out. (photos taken on 3/28)

Most of these last 10 springs these early bloomers come out; then...

This...

But you know what? I decided several week ago to enjoy the beauty of my apricot tree, even if I don't get a crop. I'm very thankful. What you see here... it isn't just snow! No! It is the result of much fasting and prayer. (I blogged about this special fast back in February.)

So we just aren't fussed... we may not have apricots this summer but we will have that much needed water. I'm so grateful for this glorious blessing.

Apricot Jam

I did a post about apricot jam back in 2008 but I decided that it was time for another one.



My friend, Sheri, calls this *Sunshine in a Jar*! And she's right! I love the warm, sunny color of apricot jam. I have 12 glorious, golden pints of goodness on my counter cooling right now. And the up side to my apricot jam recipe? The foam that is skimmed off during the cooking process becomes an additional pint of apricot syrup! Yummy!

Laster-evening Gordon and I pick what remained on the tree of the apricots. Since we live in a canyon we get some healthy wind here and have LOTS of windfall fruit. I've collected 6 grocery bags full of apricots and apples this week. All told we ended up with 3- 3 gallon [BYU ice cream] buckets of apricots. I don't know how to quantify that with the only previous crop because I discovered the wonder of BYU buckets since our last in 2008.



We always share our fruit with the Orem-variety of fruit-bats (2 families now!) and the neighbors. I'm thinking that if hard times come, and we know they eventually will, some apricot jam ought to liven up our food storage fair considerably.

So for this year... I will continue to be the little Grammie-jammie-maker.

Apricot Jam

This is my third batch of apricot jam and I just had to get out my camera and record the goodness. I wish I had smell-a-vision-blog so you could smell the sweet fruity air in my kitchen. I got this recipe from Jens Alfke's blog. It was exactly what I was looking for, one that didn't use a boat-load of sugar and didn't require pectin (which goes for $1.99+ at my local market). I loved his wit in writing.

The recipe is easy (the proportions are):
1 cup apricots
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 tsp lemon juice



You mix this together and let it sit for 2 hours (I usually end up getting distracted and it sits longer, but no harm done).

This is what the yummy goo looks like after sitting.








So now we turn on the heat and start cooking... and stirring. Bring it to a boil. It will start to foam. You need to skim off the foam.
(This is an important step here. On the first batch, I started skimming off the foam and then when it stopped foaming I added it back in. Well, that isn't what the recipe said and now I know why. That batch is not as jelled as I would like it to be.)
A little trick here, if you add 1/2 tsp butter it will reduce the foaming drastically. Jens says to save this foam for syrup. Joanie says mix about 1/3 c syrup and 2 tsp butter, heat and dip your pancakes in... yummy!! Pancakes are finger food aren't they?






OK back the jam-truck up a minute. When the jam starts to boil, set your timer for 25 minutes. That is how long you will need to cook the jam. Remember, no pectin, more cooking. I find that if I stir it every couple of minutes I do fine, but if you want to stir more than that have at it!








Now sing the song..."Just keep cooking, cooking, cooking, ah-ha-ha!"

Pretty soon your timer will buzz and your jam should be reduced almost by half. (See the line on the inside of the pan?)









This is my favorite part (but I'm going to make you go over to Jens blog and read how to get your jars ready and about the apricot kernels and rings and all that stuff). Ladle the hot jam into clean jars. I use a wide mouth funnel that used to be my mom's. She was the one who started me on all of this 36 year ago. If you slopped any jam on the rim of the jar, wipe it off (the funnel prevents that mess and speaking of mess, you notice that I have the jar in a flat bowl and the funnel is right up next to the pan to reduce clean up later... always thinking!) Place your lids on the jars, tighten and then invert the jars. Jens says this sterilizes the lids. I like his thinking.












Well, maybe this really is my favorite part... eating the jam, said the Little Red Hen.













Now this is the finished product. Ready to be stored safely in the basement (I just love having a basement!!!) It will be a lovely treat.










I've also put up 14 quarts of apricots. Not always a big favorite at my house.















And I dried a bunch. They just seem more tasty and tempting this way than in the jar.
Notice the fuzzy whiteness?... yeah, that isn't mold, but apricot skin fuzz. Tasty!






(And can I just say one more tiny thing? I sure wish that Blogger was wysiwyg!! I go back and forth a dozen times with a post like this to get everything just where I want it. There has to be an easier way!!)

Textures... of all sorts!

Today has been all about textures for me! It started out with a little perusing over at the js.com forum. JeanneD (it sounds so first grade to me!) gave us all a heads up about some fun textures. I've wanted to fool around with them a little more. I love the look. I went and collected the 14 FREE textures and then played for a little with some photos. First I tried a photo of myself... (I may try again) but ended up using one of my CA poppy photos from last April. I am very pleased with the way this turned out.


Having accomplished this bit of fun-ness I needed to get moving and do something with the fruit that is coming out of my ears! Last week I spent a couple of days making red currant jam (I refuse to filter the juice and make jelly!)

But this week is the beginning of the apricots. Last evening Gordon & I went and picked two big boxes of apricots off our loaded tree. This afternoon there were enough ripe apricots to make jam. Now I'm not a sugar Nazi, but when the recipe on the pectin box calls for 2 cups of fruit and 4 cups of sugar (no, I didn't mix that up... 2x1!) I just can't abide that. So I Googled apricot jam recipes and found this very delightful and cleverly written recipe by some dude named Jens with more realistic ratios of 1 fruit to 3/4 c sugar. I used Jens recipe.

The texture part comes in here... the apricots start out somewhat firm, get a little gooshy as I chopped them up, then went to a wonderfully slimmy stage as the sugar was mixed in. As it started cooking it starts to foam (1/2 tsp. butter solves this problem quite well. Last week I had to keep taking partly cooked jam out of the currant mixture because it just kept getting bigger and bigger and wanting to boil all over my stove... but I foiled it with quick spooning. I like the butter idea better.). The longer it cooks the more syrupy it becomes with chunks of apricot-y goodness floating in the mix. Now it is residing in 8 pint mason jars waiting to be opened and spread on hot toast this winter!

At the same time I was cooking the apricot jam I was texturizing with strawberries too. (Have you ever realized how bumply strawberries are with all of those little seeds?) I bought a flat on Saturday for family dinner and not too many got eaten. I used the aforementioned pectin (with half the amount of sugar, thank you very much) and made freezer jam. I used the potato masher to squish these up, then because it was looking a little lumpy, I put half of them in the blender and whirred them minimally. Gordon helped again with stirring and ladling into containers as both jams got finished at the same time. (Not such good planning on my part.) Now there are also 7 pints of strawberry-goodness in the fridge waiting to "set up" before being moved to the freezer.

So that is what my tactile and visual textures are all about "this day"!

Later... more playing...