Mermaid Kitchen: Jammy Business

We all know that I love to have a go in the kitchen. I don't often shy away from baking projects (gelatine being the obvious moment where I do shy away!) So it surprises me that it has taken me this long to have a go at jam. Especially as the recipe is so simple.

What do you need to make jam? Equal parts fruit and sugar. That's it. Well, a thermometre helps too. I recently treated myself to a ThermalPro thermometre as part of a "bulking up a necessary Amazon order to get free P&P" situation. My hope is that having a digital thermometre will revolutionise my hot sugar projects. Accurate readings must mean accurate sweets, right?

Eeeeehhhhh. The honeycomb I made the other week did not mix properly and I will get onto what happened with the jam. Thankfully, these happenings seem to be down to human error rather than malfunctioning tools so there is at least that.

I decided to make damson jam. Growing up we had a number of damson trees in the garden and one year we had a bumper crop. We could not harvest them quick enough! We kept rabbits and chickens in our orchard and they were eating the fermenting damsons from the ground. I tell you, drunk rabbits are funny. This was the year we had damson everything. Damson jam, damson coulis - if you could put damsons in it, we did. This has to be over fifteen years ago and I haven't really had damsons since! So when I received a tub-ful from the Holland family orchard I knew it was jam time.

It was an interesting and messy process.

 

Damsons have stones so those needed removing. Having been given the damsons a couple weeks ago, they have been in my freezer for a while. Guess which eejit forgot to take the damsons out at breakfast! Semi-defrosted damsons are weird. Some were still solid while others were just goo contained in purple. Still, I used the time I took to de-pit the damsons to sterilise the jars in the oven. Once done, I was so eager to find out how much weight I was working with that I made my first mistake. I should have blitzed the fruity goop in my blender before adding the sugar and putting it on the heat.

The thought did occur to me. Just after I had added the sugar and put it on the heat.

Never mind. I like lumpy jam. It's an assurance there is legit fruit in your jam.

Having said that, I did give the damsons a good old mash with my potato masher. It sort of worked? Obviously not as well as a blender would, but the lumps were considerably smaller afterwards. I kept the heat low while the sugar dissolved and then cranked it up to achieve that rolling boil. Once the sugar had dissolved, I took the jars out of the oven so they could cool a little. Then it was a matter of keeping my eyes glued to the thermometre while I juggled it, a wooden spoon, and the masher.

I eventually bailed on the masher.

I still somehow ended up a sticky mess. I got jam on my socks! I'm not sure how.

According to the recipe I found on BBC Good Food, the setting temperature for jam is 105C. So that is what I kept my eyes on. The second it hit that temp, I took it off the heat and decanted into my jars. This may have been my second mistake. I really need to stop skim reading recipes and going, "Oh yeah, I can remember that!" Should I have let it boil at 105C for a bit or was I right to take it off straight away? The reason I ask is because my jam did not really set.

It is more Bonne Maman than Hartley's in consistency. Honestly, it works for me because that is how I like my jam, but it wasn't what I was hoping for. I guess this just means I have to make more jam. For now, I am going to enjoy pouring my lumpy jam out onto hot crumpets.

Does anyone have any jam making tips for me? Would anyone like the recipe I sort of followed? What is your favourite flavour of jam and what do you like to put it on?

For me it is blackcurrant jam on all butter croissants with that decadent extra slab of proper butter in it, for good measure.

Listening to: Time Capsule