Red Gooseberry Jam 2017

Spring and mainly Summer are the times in the year when fruits are ripe.
This year (2017) has an abundance of fruit in my tiny garden.

It started of with wild strawberries in Spring.

Wild strawberries; growing like weeds in any open spot in my garden.

Tiny and very yummy.

For 2 weeks I could pick a handful DAILY!.

Then the raspberries: enough to make a fruit cake - if I had not eaten them all like they are.

Raspberries. Once picked the stem they grew on withers. New ones grow from the ground - thus replenishing all the time during growing season and ready for next year's harvest.

One of the many daily bowls full of raspberries.

This lasted for about a month.

Now, by the end of July, the red gooseberries are ripe. This time though I picked them all in one day:

The red gooseberries; very many this year. The bush in this large pot is about 10 years old now (about 7 of those I had it); berries on it every year in varying amount.

One side picked, many still on the bush

Bowl full, still lots on the bush

The first 500 grams -

and another 500+ grams.

Being this many I finally had enough fruits at once that I could make a jam. 

Cooking up the jam (all of the fruits in one pot)

Prepared twist-sealed lid glasses

Yummy!

Jam is ready!! Upside down for sealing and cooling.

Now I can eat red gooseberries all Winter. 😁

Bloodplum Jam

I have this bloodplum tree growing in my garden

This year it had lots of flowers

and now it has a vast abundance of fruit.

cherry-sized and the same color as the leaves = hard to see

So many fruits that I harvested about 6 kg of them;

That's about 2 kg in a pot in this photo.

but only those that were within reach without climbing into the tree
or using a unstable ladder on uneven ground to get them.

May the birds and ants have the fruits that are still on the tree. =))

So, all that fruit was simply too much to eat for me alone before it would get moldy.
I decided to make jam from it.
Cutting the tiny fruits open to get out the stones was tedious work for the first two batches
(without photos and one with cinnamon and ginger spices, the other pure fruit).

So for my third batch I decided to try out something "new" to me:
I boiled the fruits first, complete with stones, but without any sugar or pectin for jelling.

I have not added any  water, it's all from the fruits from heating. 

It worked well, and after pureeing it and mashing it,
I had the pure juice and fruit pulp in the pot

and the skins and stones in the mesh. =))

(the yellow color is a reflection of the mesh, the true color is similar to the juice)

Now just and the sugar /pectin mix

using a 2:1 ready mix  (2 parts fruit 1 part sugar)

and cinnamon again (goes so well with plum flavor)

make it all boil until it starts to stiffen,
fill in twist-off glasses,

place them upside down to cool.

Viola - finished jam without time consuming work to get the stones out.

It tastes simply yummy - and I think the amount of jam I made will last a whole year.
Yes, I'm the only one that eats jam around here............