Saturday, September 15, 2012

Signs of autumn

Deadlines loom. I should be writing. Instead, today was a baking/canning day. 

First on the menu: Red current jam. Finding red currents in the US is a rarity, so I went into full whining/pleading mode with Grey when I saw these beauties at the grocery store (Grey was actually sold when he saw the berries, but he was also curious to see how much of a spectacle I was willing to showcase to obtain them. Apparently, I did not disappoint).



Red currents are renown for being incredibly simple to make jam from, requiring no additional pectin. Considering I'm still a neophyte, this recipe did not disappoint. Stems and berries can be cooked with copious amounts of sugar and then strained through cheesecloth or processed through a food mill. Since we don't own a food mill and I wanted more of a jam, I separated the berries from the stems. Tedious work, but the outcomes is amazing.


While waiting for the berries to simmer, I set upon project #2: old-fashion apple dumplings.

A coworker brought a bunch of cooking apples to work, as his trees are yielding more fruit then he knows what to do with. Grey has fond memories as a child apple picking in Eastern Washington and I remember apples being a sure sign of autumn and the start of the school year. I spent a couple of hours sorting through recipes before I began, simply because I couldn't believe that some were calling for Mountain Dew.


This is clearly a first pass, as none of these babies are uniform in size or shape. Still, Grey's first response when entering the kitchen was "it smells like autumn," so I'm hoping I did something right.

5 comments:

  1. "It smells like autumn." What a compliment to your baking! Glad you are enjoying the fruits of autumn.

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  2. Yum -- I can almost smell those apple dumplings! And I love this line: (Grey was actually sold when he saw the berries, but he was also curious to see how much of a spectacle I was willing to showcase to obtain them. Apparently, I did not disappoint). I'm glad my hubby isn't the only one who does stuff like that! :-)

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  3. I bet it tasted wonderful. I didn't know that currents were so easy to make into jam. I'll have to give that a try sometime.

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  4. Ooh, the dumplings look good! I've never attempted jam, either...currant sounds wonderful.

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