Pump Up the Jams

As you may have inferred from my last post, I had a bunch of apples to use up this fall after we went apple picking. Now if you know me, you know that I am single-handedly seeking to bring back the lost art of canning to my generation. This usually leads to people staring at my giant water-bath canner and various tools of the trade with a lot of perplexity, and a general reaction that I'm a tad bit crazy. But somehow when the jam starts rolling out of my kitchen in the summer and fall and into the hands of my friends, that skepticism disappears. Canning definitely takes a fair amount of time and equipment to undertake, but it is vastly easier than you might think. If you are thinking of getting into it, I would definitely recommend investing in the Ball Home Canning Basics Kit for equipment, and the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving and the Joy of Cooking: All About Canning and Preserving for good basic recipes for jams, jellies, pickles, and sauces. Canning is a great way to preserve the fresh foods of spring, summer, and fall all year round, and is thus super eco-friendly (i.e. you are not expending fossil fuels by importing fruit from Chile in the winter, etc.).

In that light, here is the recipe for the Apple Maple Jam that I made this year. It is especially good on toasted English muffins, and tastes just like fall to me. The next time I make it, I want to play around with substituting some of the white sugar for brown sugar, and maybe adding a bit more maple syrup. Let me know if you experiment with it successfully, but before you do, make sure you know how to can safely!

Apple Maple Jam (from the Ball Blue Book of Preserving)

Ingredients:

• 3 quarts (about 6 pounds or 20-24) apples, peeled, cored, and chopped
• 6 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon allspice
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon cloves
• 1 cup maple syrup

Directions:

1. Combine all ingredients in a large stockpot (emphasis on the large!) and stir to coat apples evenly with sugar, spices, and syrup. Bring slowly to a boil.
2. Cook rapidly to the gelling point. As mixture thickens, stir frequently to prevent sticking. Cook until apples have broken down and mixture is thick and bubbly. (You may want to help things along by using a potato masher at this stage) Remove from heat and skim foam if necessary.
   
3. Ladle hot jam into hot half-pint or pint jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Adjust two-piece caps. Process 10 minutes in boiling-water canner.

Note: The original recipe says it will yield 8 half-pint jars, but I ended up getting more like 12-14 given the size of my apples, so make sure you have plenty of sterilized jars ready in advance. Great holiday gifts! (sorry for the spoiler, friends and family...)