How I miss Wisconsin for its plentiful rhubarb! A friend of ours had a whole mess of rhubarb in his yard, so we were never in short supply. Unlike here, where there is only a smattering of rhubarb in the farmers' markets (in the ones I've been to, anyway).
So, the jam started with making candied orange peel last week.
It uses a ton of sugar, but it's worth it. The dried stuff is good for baking, but I enjoyed it most right after removing it from the boiling water and rolling it in sugar. When the peel still has liquid in it, it's like eating one of those garish candy orange slices that you buy at Walgreen's, but only a billion times better because it's real. When I first tried the orange peel, it was like a big carnival in my mouth - so much flavor! Yum!
But, don't worry, I didn't eat all of the orange peel. I reserved the rest for the jam, which also used ginger and crystallized ginger. The rhubarb hung out in a big bowl of sugar for a day, and then I cooked it all up. Since this jam didn't use powdered pectin, I had to cook it for a while over high heat. While doing so, I suffered my first canning injury when some of the hot hot hot jam spattered onto part of my toes not covered by my Keens. Ow.
In the end, I came out with this:
Two pints and one half pint. Yep, 2.5 lbs of rhubarb, 5 cups of sugar, 1/4 cup of orange peel, and 4 oz of crystallized ginger, and this is all I have to show for it. Well, it is quite tasty, so that's a good thing.
All for now! Have a great week!
1 comment:
That's all? 2+ pounds of rhubarb, all of that sugar, and a toe injury to boot? It sounds yummy, though. I've never had rhubarb orange ginger jam!
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