(Alright, before getting into the rhube, time to come clean: I’m ’bout to have a bébé over here. Any day now. Hence the slowing down of the blogging, right down to a trickle. Renovations and some frantic nesting have left me very little time to consider the pantry with. And just in time for canning season! All this to say that this blog is easing its way into a bit of a maternity leave. We’ll see what happens over the summer. I hope to still can and blog, but the whole thing may be rather more sporadic… Anyway, happy summer canning, jamming, pickling and preserving to one and all!) And now back to your regular scheduled programming:
Rhubarb heralds summer’s sweet beginnings. Makes me think of Slip ‘n’ Slide, Orange Crush, above-ground pools, hamburgers with buns as moist and sweet as cake. Its tangy, slightly fibrous mushiness makes it one of summer’s comfort foods.
I came across a recipe for rhubarb-ginger jam in my copy of The Complete Book of Preserving from 1976 and I’ve adapted it slightly here, cutting the sugar a little since the crystallized ginger adds a lot of sweetness.
Here goes:
Rhubarb-ginger jam
2.5 lbs rhubarb cut into 1-in. pieces
3 cups sugar
1/2 cup water
juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tbsp crystallized ginger, finely chopped
2-inch piece of ginger
Bring your rhubarb, water, lemon juice and sugar to a boil, stirring often. Take your nub of ginger and beat it up a little with a meat hammer or some other implement that will help release its juices and add it to your bubbling fruit mix along with the crystallized stuff.
Cook until your reach the desired jammy consistency (I went for about 30 minutes), remove ginger bit and process as usual in hot, clean jars (I boil them for 10 minutes).
10 Comments
Congratulations!!! And I hear you on baby induced blogging slowdowns!
Hi Sara,
Why, thank you! Yep, exactly – unless it’s a baby blog? Have a great summer.
Congratulations, Gen! That is so exciting. Worth missing the season for and then some, though I’m sure you’ll get some canning in …Good luck with everything.
Congratulations!
For me, having a baby in summer is good with canning! But I know that everybody are not like me.
Hope everything is going well for your family.
Hi there, Thanks for your well wishes, new fam is great, canning’s on the back burner for at least a month but that still leaves plenty of stuff to do in Aug and Sept. Hope you’re enjoying this hot, hot summer.
Hi Julia, oh thanks so much! I might need some tips on juggling blogging and baby
My wife & I gave out small jars of this jam as favors at our wedding, 9 years ago! I love this recipe!
Hey! Oh, I looove that idea. I got married 6 years ago, before the canning bug bit me. But what an amazing idea! I’m gonna tell everyone I know who gets married from now on that they should make jam or pickle favours or centrepieces. So good.
Of course, now you know that sleep is top priority! Hope you and baby are sleeping well!
Hi Julia! OMG yesss: SLEEP. The holy grail of babydom. He’s actually not bad at it – 5 and a half hours the other night and he’s just over 2 months. They say 5 hours qualifies as ’sleeping thru the night’ so we’re stoked. But as you know, it varies wildly.
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