Thursday, June 2, 2011

Strawberries!

It's officially strawberry season!  We went to Tougas Farm today and picked the first of the delicious berries. I was prepared to do all the picking while the boys sat and ate them or just wrestled with one another, per usual.  However, it turns out I have fabulous berry pickers for children!  We picked 18lbs of berries in about a half an hour.  We have plans for jam, pie and shortcake.   
I made an attempt to make jam.  Yup.  A bust.
Literally...one jar busted open in the hot water bath.  Prior to that, the pot overflowed with sugary strawberry goodness all over my stove.  Note to self - use a bigger pot, no matter how good of an eye you think you'll keep on the stove.  So, I had overflowing pots, burning sugar on the stove, glass jars busting open.  To boot, I'm pretty sure the ratio of sugar to berries to pectin is off and that the processing wasn't long enough.  I'm anticipating a very thin jam.  All I can say is, "Get out the vanilla ice cream, here comes strawberry sauce!"
Stay tuned for take number two...


No comments: