It's been a strange couple of years here for strawberries. Typically in late Spring/early Summer there are a multitude of advertisements for U-Pick strawberry places in the local section of the newspaper. Last year we dutifully checked the paper every day and by mid-July realized "I don't think there are going to be any strawberries to pick this year", and there really weren't. So last year, we had to GASP! go without homemade strawberry jam for an entire year.
Being without homemade strawberry jam for a year was sad, but we did have our awesome raspberry currant jam to help fill the void. This year we decided to not only look in the paper, but also be a bit more proactive (this was a new sensation for me) and search out U-Pick places. After some telephoning around last weekend, Alycia embarked on a strawberry picking journey of great importance.
Strawberry fields, not quite forever, but close. The hooded and cloaked figure in the distance is Alycia's Mom, who met Alycia at the fields and picked berries of her own.
Only $8 bucks for this bucket of berries.
Alycia picked all these berries. Many met their fate in the jamming pot, others were consigned to death by freezing.
It started to rain just as Alycia was leaving, which was really good timing. There's an old Icelandic saying "a soggy berry picker is a sad berry picker".
Your intrepid blogger and jam maker topping berries and preparing the jam ingredients. We made 16 jars (mostly 1/2 pint) of delicious strawberry jam. Winters in North Dakota are pretty long, and anything that helps you get through it, like delicious strawberry jam, really helps. I'll post the jam recipe and pictures of the finished product in another post.
Being without homemade strawberry jam for a year was sad, but we did have our awesome raspberry currant jam to help fill the void. This year we decided to not only look in the paper, but also be a bit more proactive (this was a new sensation for me) and search out U-Pick places. After some telephoning around last weekend, Alycia embarked on a strawberry picking journey of great importance.
4 comments:
There is nothing like homemade food. I wanted to get out and pick berries, but the season went by so fast I did not get a chance. On the weekend I made Rose Petal Jelly. It has a wonderful taste rather like crabapple jelly.
I love the two shades of Monarda you have- the purple especially. I'd love to add them to my garden.
Thanks Jennifer. Rose Petal Jelly sounds very tasty. I'm trying for the life of me to recall where I ordered the Monarda from (online somewhere), but I can't track it down. As soon as I do I'll pass it along.
This was a bad year for strawberries. They were hit by the cold and then the hard rain. So no strawberry jam was made here. However, we did make sour cherry jam and gooseberry jam. We may do peach later on. Gooseberry jam tastes good but is more trouble than it is worth.
Love homemade jam!
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