Grapes - watercolor painting by Carol Egbert

There was caviar, pate, platters of unfamiliar cheeses and even an oyster bar. I was twenty-five years old and impressed. In the midst of this exotic spread, there was a chafing dish filled with sweet and sour meatballs that were irresistible. I asked a fellow meatball-spearing guest if she knew how the meatballs had been prepared. “Oh,” she said, “these are always served at Peter’s parties. He’s related to the Welch’s, the grape people, and this is his favorite way to eat grape jelly.” Trying to keep up my side of clever party banter I added, “Yes, of course, and the meat balls are filled with peanut butter.” With an un-amused shake of her head she said, “Actually, the sauce is made by combining equal portions of Heinz chili sauce and Welch’s grape jelly, the culinary merger of two important families,” and walked off.

Jam unexpectedly came to my rescue when I was a passenger on a Russian train traveling from Mongolia to Siberia in the mid 1980’s. I was weary and homesick and craved a pot of freshly brewed tea flavored with a squeeze of lemon and a bit of sugar. I went to the dining car and asked the waiter, chef and busboy (all the same person), for a pot of tea.

The tea came in a small, dented metal teapot, along with a chipped mug, a spoon and a small pot of strawberry jam. I asked why he had brought me a pot of jam when there was nothing to spread it on. He explained that there were no lemons on the train or probably anywhere else in Siberia and, more importantly, real Russian tea was flavored and sweetened with jam rather than with lemon and sugar. I put half a teaspoon of jam into the mug, he shook his head, took the spoon and added a very rounded spoonful of jam to the mug, filled it with tea, stirred it vigorously, handed the mug to me with an expectant smile and hovered as I sipped. The tea was very strong and quite smoky, the addition of the strawberry jam made it palatable and a few hours later we parted as friends when the train pulled into the station in Irkutsk.

It was a jar of peach jam in my pantry that saved the day last summer when I was preparing the dressing for a brown rice and papaya salad for a potluck picnic. I had forgotten to buy a jar of mango chutney and had no time to make a trip to the market but I did have a jar a peach jam in the pantry. Combined with spices, vinegar and oil, it provided the sweet note that made the salad sing. Since then I always use peach jam rather than mango chutney when I make this salad. Here’s how I did it:

Brown Rice and Papaya Salad

I began by preparing the rice. I preheated the oven to 375 degrees, heated two and a half cups of water, one tablespoon of unsalted butter and one tablespoon of kosher salt in a saucepan. I put one and a half cups of short-grain brown rice into an eight-inch square, ceramic baking dish. When the water was boiling, I poured it over the rice, covered the dish tightly with aluminum foil and baked it for one hour. I uncovered the rice and fluffed it with a fork and set it aside to cool.

I cut a peeled and de-seeded large, ripe papaya into one-inch chunks. I put the chunks into a large salad bowl. I cut one medium red onion into quarter inch dice and put it into a small bowl of salted, cold water to eliminate the raw onion tang. I added one large red pepper cut into half-inch chunks, one finely minced jalapeno pepper, half a cup of walnuts, half a cup of raisins, the leaves from a bunch of cilantro, the rinsed and drained onion and the cooled rice to the papaya chunks.

For the dressing, I blended together two teaspoons of ground cumin, one teaspoon of ground coriander, one minced clove of garlic, three tablespoons of red wine vinegar, three tablespoons of olive oil and half a cup of peach jam. I stirred the dressing into the rice and papaya mixture and headed to the picnic that was jam packed with friends.

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Apricot Almond Conserve

I used scissors to snip half a pound of dried apricots into strips. I combined the apricot pieces with one cup of golden raisins and three cups of water. I covered the fruit and left it to soak overnight in the fridge.

The next morning, I tipped the fruit into a saucepan and added about a cup of water to make the liquid come halfway to the top of the fruit. I added the grated zest of one orange and simmered the mixture for fifteen minutes. When the fruit was very tender, I added one cup of orange juice and the juice of one lemon and two and a half cups of sugar and cooked the conserve, over medium heat, stirring constantly until it was thick, about thirty minutes. I added half a cup of slivered blanched almonds and cooked it for five minutes more, removed it from the heat, stirred in three tablespoons of amaretto liqueur and ladled the conserve into four sterilized half-pint jars. I sealed them following the manufacturer’s directions, labeled the jars when the conserve had cooled and asked Charles to package them up so that they could be mailed to the Noah and Matthew.

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Leah comes from Atlanta and was amazed that I had never tasted this party classic. She generously shared the collection of cream cheese dip recipes that she had found in her Junior League cookbooks. Leah is a self-described ‘dump-cook,’ she doesn’t measure ingredients and doesn’t cook what she can buy. She used pepper jelly from the market but I prefer the flavor of homemade hot and sweet red pepper jam. This jam uses liquid pectin to thicken and has never failed to gel. Here’s how I did it:

Sweet and Hot Red Pepper Jam

I used a food processor to chop three medium, seeded and de-ribbed sweet peppers, about two cups, and two medium seeded and de-ribbed hot red peppers. I added half a cup of cider vinegar to the food processor and chopped until the mixture was a very coarse puree.

I put the puree into a medium saucepan along with one cup of cider vinegar and one teaspoon of kosher salt and simmered it, uncovered, for five minutes. I removed it from the heat, measured the mixture and added enough water to make a total of three cups of liquid. I added six and a half cups of sugar, brought the mixture to a full, rolling boil over high heat and boiled it for one minute. I removed it from the heat and stirred in a six-ounce bottle of liquid pectin. I skimmed off the foam, cooled the jam for three minutes, and stirred it to distribute the bits of pepper before I ladled the jam into sterilized half-pint jars and sealed the jars following the manufacture’s directions.

I like this jam with roasted chicken or spread on a roast beef sandwich. Whenever I serve it as she did, I think of Leah and her family, back in Atlanta, and wonder what she’s dumping on cream cheese.

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Even though berry season has passed, the wild grapes are gone and any apples still on trees belong to hungry birds or deer it’s possible to make preserves with dried fruits like apricots, peaches, raisins and seasonal fruits like cranberries, oranges, lemons and grapefruit. The addition of spices, herbs, vinegar or liquor makes these gifts from the kitchen special.

Bright, ruby red, cranberry-rosemary jelly is the right color and flavor for the Christmas season. The color comes from the cranberries and the combination of citrus and rosemary makes it compatible with pork, turkey and if a hunter helps supply your larder, with venison and game birds. Here’s how I made it:

Cranberry-Rosemary Jelly

I washed three medium oranges, quartered and sliced them, peel and all, as thinly as possible. I combined the orange slices with four and half cups of water in a medium, stainless steel saucepan, covered it and left it on the counter over night.

The next morning, I brought the mixture to a boil, covered the pot and reduced the heat to medium. After the oranges had simmered for fifteen minutes, I added two cups of cranberries, a third of a cup of fresh rosemary leaves and four whole cloves. I simmered this mixture for an additional twenty minutes, covered, until the cranberries and oranges were very soft.

I lined a colander with two layers of cheesecloth, set it over a large bowl and ladled the fruit mixture into the colander. After a couple of hours most of the juice had dripped into the bowl. I pressed the fruit gently to squeeze out the last few drops but resisted the urge to squeeze the cheesecloth because pulp would make the jelly cloudy.

I measured the juice, put it into a large saucepan and brought it to a boil. I added an equal quantity of sugar, three cups of juice required three cups of granulated sugar, boiled the liquid, skimmed off the foam and cooked it over medium heat until the thermometer read 220º F.

I ladled the hot jelly into small jars that had been washed and sterilized in boiling water. Rather than sealing the jars by processing in boiling water, I sealed each jar with melted paraffin wax. When the wax had hardened and the jelly cooled, I labeled the jars and stored them on a cool shelf in the pantry.

This recipe made four cups of jelly and it can be doubled. It’s best to cook the jelly in small batches; three cup of juice with three cups of sugar is ideal. Many recipes for jelly suggest that it be cooked until ‘sheets’ or passes the ‘jelly test’, but I’ve never succeeded with that method so I use a candy thermometer.

Click here for a link to Jam, Jelly & Conserve labels to down load and print.

Nine months after we moved to Vermont, I saw branches of white blossoms on trees near a deer trail. I mucked across a muddy stream and discovered that our house had come with a long abandoned, five-tree apple orchard. The trees were growing in a hollow, overrun with weed trees, sumac and tall grass. We left our first harvest to the deer whose narrow paths had led me to these trees. The following year we rescued the trees from the weeds. Since then, we share the apples with the deer.

The first step in making anything with apples is harvesting them. I found a small wire fruit picker that looks like a basket with fingers at the hardware store and clamped it to a long pole. It made it possible to harvest the apples without dragging a ladder to the orchard. Apples have a natural, waxy coating that prevents dehydration so I don’t wash them until I’m ready to cook them. After I picked the apples, I made applesauce and apple jelly with the same pot of apples. Here’s how I did it:

Apple Sauce

I scrubbed the apples with a vegetable brush and then quartered them. I cut out bruised spots and kept a lookout for insects, but I didn’t peel, seed or core the apples. The apple pieces went into a large, heavy-bottomed pot and I added cold water until they floated and there was an inch of water beneath them. After the water had come to a boil, it took about fifteen minutes of simmering for the apples to cook through and fall apart.

I used a slotted spoon to transfer the apple pulp from the liquid to a food mill. The applesauce was forced through the food mill into a bowl, and the cores, seeds, peels and stems remained behind. I sealed the unsweetened applesauce in pint jars following the directions that came with the canning jars. On frosty mornings, a bowl of hot applesauce, topped with a generous sprinkle of cinnamon sugar and served with toasted, English muffins is the perfect breakfast. I add sweetener – sugar, maple syrup or honey, and spice – ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon or allspice whenever I serve it as a side dish, and use unsweetened applesauce in cakes, muffins and cookies.

I added sugar to the apple flavored and pectin rich liquid that remained in the pot after I taken out the apple pulp to make the applesauce and boiled it to make apple jelly. Here’s how I did it:

Apple Jelly

I strained the liquid, using a jelly bag suspended on a tall, three-legged stand over a large bowl. I measured it  and added three-quarters of a cup of granulated sugar for each cup of liquid. I’ve found that it’s best to work with four-cup batches of liquid combined with three cups of sugar. I heated the mixture until it came to a rolling boil, skimmed off the foam and reduced the heat to a gentle simmer until the thermometer read 105º C / 220º F.

I steeped two stems of fresh basil leaves in the hot jelly for two minutes before I removed the basil and poured the jelly into four half-pint jars and sealed them.

The remaining half-cup of jelly was delicious smeared on hot, buttered biscuits at dinner. The fresh basil added a mild, minty flavor that went well with the roasted chicken but I don’t always add herbs to apple jelly. Sometimes, I use a stem of fresh mint, rosemary or thyme in place of the basil. Plain apple jelly spread on biscuits still hot from the oven is a lovely way to say “Good Morning.”

It’s easy to spot wild grape vines that have climbed trees, utility poles and wires to reach the sunlight and their yellowing leaves are the signal that it’s harvest time. When cooked with sugar, the grapes that Charles and I harvest each fall become an intense grape jelly. I made eighteen jars of jelly with this year’s harvest. We will spread it on toast, use it to flavor yogurt, give it to friends and enjoy the rest slathered on sponge cake in divine jelly rolls. With just grapes and sugar and a bit of water the jelly is easy to make. Here’s how I did it:

Grape Jelly

I removed leaves, moldy grapes and large pieces of vine from the grapes but didn’t separate the grapes from the smaller pieces of vine and stems. After rinsing the grapes in cold water I put them into my largest pot. I added a cup of water and stirred the grapes frequently as I heated them over medium heat. After about fifteen minutes, they had softened and released their juice. I used a food mill to separate the juice from the stems, seeds and peels.

I cooked the jelly in four-cup batches – four cups of juice combined with six cups of sugar. I used a ladle to skim the foam that formed as the juice and sugar boiled. When the jelly reached 220º, I poured it into half-pint mason jars and followed the directions that came with the jars for heat processing.

I used them as a base for pasta sauce and for grilled pizza during the gray days of the following winter.

Whether I added them to pasta sauce, used them to top pizza or on toasted bread for brushetta, I always began by pureeing the tomatoes with either a food processor or an immersion blender. The intense flavor of the roasted tomatoes satisfied my tomato desire until I emptied the last jar on Town Meeting Day.

Here how I did it:

Oven Roasted Tomatoes

I made oven-roasted tomatoes in four pound batches. I cut the tomatoes in half lengthwise, removed the seeds and the liquid surrounding them, sprinkled the cut side of each tomato with kosher salt and put the tomatoes, cut side down onto a double layer of paper towels. After half an hour, I put the drained tomatoes into two ceramic baking dishes that were large enough to hold them, cut side up, in a single layer. I topped each dish of tomatoes with half a cup of diced onions, a quarter of a cup of olive oil, six unpeeled garlic cloves and half a teaspoon of minced fresh rosemary leaves. After two hours in 200º F oven, the tomatoes had collapsed and the juices had begun to caramelize. I packed the tomatoes into half pint jars, added tomato sauce to fill the jar to within half an inch of the top and then followed the directions that came with the jars for heat processing in boiling water.  Note: There is a print link embedded within this post, please visit this post to print it.

The announcement went on to say that Ken had many more raspberries than he could possibly pick. Although I wasn’t dressed for raspberry picking, I was willing to help. Charles and I followed the directions, drove up a bumpy, country road, dappled with sunlight and found Ken’s house.

The enormous, overgrown, raspberry patch was behind an equally large vegetable garden. Raspberries, the fruit of perennial plants whose name comes from a European variety called Rufus ideaus, (which translates as “with red fruit”), need lots of sun and water. From the look of his raspberry patch, this hot, Vermont summer has been perfect for the berries. When Ken planted the raspberry canes 20 years ago, he was told that he had planted them too close together and that they would die. The canes are more than five feet tall and loaded with berries that are as big as the tip of my thumb.

We shouted, “Hello!” to our fellow, emergency raspberry helpers, found a shady, bug-free place to pick and got started. In almost no time, my small basket was filled and I transferred the berries into a large flat box so that the berries on the bottom of the pile wouldn’t get squashed. After half an hour, we had eaten our fill and harvested about eight cups of berries.

I froze all of the berries, except for what we planned to eat that evening. I lined two rectangular cake pans with aluminum foil and filled them with a single layer of raspberries. After half an hour in the freezer, the berries were frozen enough to be transferred to a resealable plastic bag. It took two batches to freeze all of the berries. Freezing the berries before packing them in plastic bags makes it easy to use a few berries at a time.

Raspberries, high in vitamin C and a good source of natural fiber and antioxidants, come in many colors: red, black, purple and gold. They are expensive to buy because they are soft, bruise easily, spoil quickly and don’t ship well. It’s much better and more fun to pick your own.

Having ruby red, homemade, raspberry jam waiting patiently on a shelf in my pantry is like having summer sunshine in a jar. Here’s how I made it:

Raspberry Jam

Sugar dissolves more easily if it is warm, so I began making the jam by putting four cups of sugar into a shallow pan and heated it in a 250°F oven for 15 minutes. While the sugar heated, I removed the seeds from four cups of raspberries by heating the berries. When the fruit and seeds began to separate, I mashed the berries with the back of a spoon and then pushed the fruit through a fine strainer into a bowl and most of the seeds stayed in the strainer.

I put the de-seeded raspberries back into the saucepan, added the warm sugar and after about five minutes of boiling, the liquid had reached the gelling point, 220°F, and it was ready to be put into small sterilized jars and sealed following the directions that came with the jars.

I have heard that jam, properly processed, will last for at least a year but it never lasts that long in our house. It is irresistible spread on homemade scones or biscuits, stirred into a bowl of yogurt or as sauce on ice cream. We’ll be lucky if it lasts till Thanksgiving.

I’m not quite so naïve but I still marvel at the beauty of Jersey cows’ eyelashes, I’m a member of that church and I design the poster for Red Flannel Hash Supper each year.

I decided to use apples is this recipe that is the last, for the moment, in my refrigerator pickle series. In all of the refrigerator pickle recipes, measurements are arbitrary; the amount of sugar and spice can be varied.  When I don’t have enough liquid to cover the fruit or vegetable, I use vinegar to top off the jar. These pickles will keep in the fridge for at least two months. These pickles are nice with a sandwich or served with grilled chicken. Here’s how I made them:

Pickled Apples and Onions

I cored an unpeeled, Gala apple and cut it into half-inch chunks. I put a half-inch slice of red onion into a pint jar, added a layer of apples, a small piece of star anise, another onion slice a second layer of apples, another small piece of star anise and topped the apples with another slice of red onion.

I heated three quarters of a cup of rice vinegar with two tablespoons of honey and one teaspoon of grated, fresh ginger root. When the honey was completely dissolved, I poured the pickling liquid over the apple onion mixture, put the lid on the jar and when it had cooled to room temperature put it into the fridge. The star anise and rice wine vinegar gave the apples a hint of Asia.

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Lynda had been living in the Northeast Kingdom for ten years and was an old Vermont hand. At breakfast on Saturday morning, she suggested that we go to the Red Flannel Hash supper at the Woodstock Unitarian Universalist Church that evening. I assumed that red flannel was the dress code because I had been told that it was important to be visible to hunters when walking in the woods and I was pretty sure that it was hunting season. Lynda patiently explained that red flannel was a type of hash and that I could wear whatever I chose. It was at that dinner that I learned how important pickles could be.

We sat at a long table with seven strangers and were served plates piled high with hash and a scoop of baked beans. Red flannel hash, an amazing magenta really, is a mixture of ground beets, potatoes, cabbage and corned beef. Along with bread and butter, there was a bowl of pickles in the center of our table. Red flannel hash is an acquired taste – one I hadn’t acquired. I did my best with it and used a chunk of crispy, sweet/sour pickle as a chaser after each forkful. I soon gave up on the hash and focused on the pickles, commenting with delight on their flavor each time that I asked that the (much too small) bowl be refilled. As pie was served I was introduced to the woman sitting at the end of the table. Her name was Alice and her hazel eyes sparkled as she told me that she had made all of the pickles for the supper.

You can download a label for your pickles here.

Although I don’t make red flannel hash, I make pickles of all sorts. Rather than preserving quarts of cucumbers with vinegar and dill, I make small quantities of refrigerator pickles with vegetables and fruits that are in season. Refrigerator pickles are ready to eat in six hours, require no cooking, do not need to be heat processed and the possible combinations are limited only by the varieties of vinegar, sugar, herbs and spices in the pantry. I made four different kinds of pickles to take to a fourth of July picnic. Here’s how I did it:

Pickled Radishes

I put one pound of radishes, minus the tops and tails and cut into quarter inch slices, into a large bowl and tossed them with one tablespoon of kosher salt. I added enough ice water to cover and then set the radishes aside. Two hours later, the radishes had softened slightly and after I had rinsed and dried them, I packed them into a one-pint jar.

I simmered one cup of cider vinegar, three-quarters of a cup of sugar, half a teaspoon of whole black pepper, one teaspoon of celery seeds and one teaspoon of mixed pickling spices for three minutes. I poured the hot pickling liquid over the radishes, put the lid on the jar and, when it had cooled to room temperature, I put it into the fridge for six hours before serving.

The mixed pickling spices had bits of dried red chili that gave the finished radish pickles a pleasant hit of heat.