Sacred jam

Jam making season has arrived in Polwarth.  Despite not enjoying our trip to Craigie's as much as we had expected to, we plunged into preserving.   First up the blackcurrants.  A couple of year's ago we'd bought some very nice blackcurrant and sloe gin jam at the village shop in Kirkmichael.  It was - until yesterday - the best blackcurrant jam we'd tried. 

We've not got any sloes, but last week I succumbed to temptation and bought a bottle of Sacred Gin from the wonderful Provenance Wines  (@Provenance_Edin).  And the more I thought about it, the more I was convinced this was the way to go.  This is not a hit-you-over-the-head with juniper gin (although I quite like that too), but an aromatic gin.  I googled for recipes, and while I found several adverts for artisanal jams with sloe gin, no recipes popped up.  So, I decided to follow my usual blackcurrant recipe, and then chucked in 50ml of gin after I took it off the heat. It bubbled up delectably. 

The jam smelled good while cooking - always a good sign - and even better while I ladled it into bottles. We still need to label it, but I'm already wondering where I can get some more currants. 

Strawberry and rhubarb jam

2012's jam of the year was definitely strawberry-rhubarb.

It's quite popular in North America, but here in Scotland, every time I say to people 'I just made some fab strawberry-rhubarb jam', they look disapprovingly at me and say 'oh, *we* make rhubarb-ginger'.


We also tried strawberry-gooseberry, but it wasn't terribly successful. We'd picked a lot of gooseberries, but they didn't have much flavour, and jamming didn't help much. It looks nice though.

What will we discover in 2013?

Pick your own season coming up soon...

Picking 'strawbies' at Craigie's

Our jam making started three summers ago, when we first acquired a bike-trailer. In fact, this was just a trial run, when the trailer was on loan from the previous owners. We brought back the trailer full of strawberries and made lots and lots of jam. They were pretty squashed when they got home (stopping at friends' for a BBQ en route), so the jamming was pretty apocalyptic, but it all tasted good in the end. 

It also convinced us of the great value of a bike trailer, but it was quite a ride with some big hills - albeit also great views at the inch.

The next year, we cycled to Craigie's instead. It's flatter, and there's an off-road cycle path most of the way. It always seems to rain, but somehow we have fun nonetheless. 

We've picked strawberries, gooseberries and currants there.  

Currants at Craigies.

The fruit seems to arrive home in better shape too, but you'll have to wait for pictures of that in the next post.

Right now I'm just looking forward to our next picking expedition (and hoping it doesn't rain).