i made jam!

and not to toot my own horn but it's probably the best jam i ever made. of course, since i'm not the neatest of cooks it looked like i committed berry homicide on my stove before all was said and done.

i combined a few different recipes from my ball home preserving book and came up with something i called devil's black forest jam. cherries, cocoa powder, cinnamon and red pepper flakes. it's a pretty even tie with the apple rhubarb i made last fall. you open the jar and the first thing that hits you is the smell of cherries and chocolate, then you bite into it and you mostly taste cherry (while smelling the chocolate), and a tiny little zing. the pepper's not really noticable; it's more of a "hm, what is that?" taste to it. heaven. i plan on eating it on toast, in a grilled cheese and jam sandwich (probably with monterrey jack or brie, swiss is probably too strong and mozzarella too weak), over ice cream or angel food cake, and baking it on pork chops or chicken.

want a picture?

yum. and yes, i'm keeping the recipe a secret.

pickles, second round

i don't have any pictures yet, but i needed to breifly blog my pickles before i forget what i put in them!

i went into all-out experiment mode, so some of these will probably be kinda nasty, but they sounded good at the time.... that being said, i also used small jars as to not waste massive amounts of cucumber. well, they were starting to get soft anyway....

sweet pickles - apple cider vinegar, cinnamon stick, cloves
spicy-sweet pickles - apple cider vinegar, cinnamon stick, cloves, and red pepper flakes
"scarborough" pickles - regular white vinegar, parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme
scarborough-dill: self-explanatory
asian(ish) - white vinegar, dill, ginger, garlic, and few drops of soy sauce
mustard pickles - white vinegar, mustard seed, celery seed
mustard dill - white vinegar, mustard seed, celery seed, and dill!

i'm sure some of these will come out more like "ick"les, but i needed to use up those cucumbers somehow! i'm a little nervous about the sweet pickles and the asian pickles... the ginger just smelled so good with the garlic and dill though, i couldn't resist! i'll post pictures soon.

i made pickles!

but i have to wait 7 weeks before they're ready. boo.

and i'm so antsy to see if they turned out or not!! i've never done pickles before, just jam, and fruit and sugar pretty much always tastes good, so no biggie there.

here we have, from left to right: 2 jars (spicy!) dill/garlic/peppercorn/red pepper, 1 jar dill/garlic, 3 jars dill/garlic/peppercorn, 1 jar dill/garlic spears and 1 jar dill/garlic/peppercorn spears.

so far, all but one of the jars has sealed. and my family really likes crunchy, garlicky pickles, and i definitely wanted to a try a spicy variety. i barely put in a pinch of flakes, but the jars are small, so i think it'll be enough. but what to call them....? "hickles" (hot-pickles) was quickly rejected... but 7 weeks!!!! that's so long to figure out if i've made a tasty pickle. and i don't have much patience!

one other bit of good news is that they actually changed the start of school by a week so it doesn't coincide with state fair. gotta love rural iowa...

and i learned how to spin on a drop spindle last weekend. haven't done it yet though, even though my man made me a bottom-whorl drop spindle. see, i took his parents (future in-laws) to the arts festival in amana and they had a tent where this guy was just sitting out front spinning on a wheel, and him and his wife showed me so much stuff! they raise these huge, fluffy angora bunnies and that's how they got started spinning. like i need another hobby....