A transplanted Southern Californian living in North Dakota Idaho, with some insights on life with deaf dogs, a gluten free spouse, and the occasional mischievous garden gnome. Thank you for visiting and I hope you enjoy.





Wednesday, July 30, 2014

The Current Currant Harvest

This week we stripped all the currants from the red currant and black currant bushes and processed them for jam making.  It was a pretty good year for the currants and we got enough of them to make +/- 6 batches of Raspberry-Currant and Blueberry Currant jam.

Lovely bowl of red currants.  Don't worry, we washed them thoroughly and removed those leaves.   While we removed the leaves, we left the currants on their stems.  We harvested about 8 quarts total of currants.
Stunningly colored black currants.  Currants are full of pectin and with them added to a jam recipe, we don't have to use any additional pectin, it all comes from the currants and the jam sets up great.  The currants give the Raspberry-Currant and Blueberry Currant jams a nice tannin-y tart bite. 

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I never ever ate currents. I bet I am missing something good.

El Gaucho said...

Donna - Actually by themselves, they're pretty tart. Mouth puckeringly tart, but they are a great component in jam and other baking recipes. We love them and they're super low maintenance to grow.

Jennifer said...

Red currant jam is my absolute favourite. You had a wonderful harvest of berries. I must move my black currant. It has never done well where I placed it. Have a wonderful weekend!

Jason said...

Yum, looks delicious!

anointedtoday said...

So that is what those red berries are. I have seen them before, but never really new that they were red currants. I would see the birds eating them, so I figured they must be good.