Strawberry Harvest

Last friday, Andrew and I went and did our first pick of the season for strawberries at Jones' in Shelton.  Since Andrew worked there last year,  I had somewhat of an expert as a picking buddy and even though it was still considered "early picking" we filled up one of the large baskets in no time at all.  It was a beautiful day out so it was nice to spend some time outdoors and for those of you who haven't been to Jones' yet, it's a great experience any time throughout the year whether you are picking Christmas trees, pumpkins or berries because the scenary is beautiful and you get to spend some quality time becoming one with mother nature (yes, you read correctly...those words actually came out of my mouth.  See this is what happens when you work in the concrete jungle of New York City).

I made a batch of strawberry almond scones with a few of the them and then pureed some of my strawberries that I had frozen from last year to make a strawberry ice cream for dessert that we had after dinner Sunday night that turned out really well.  I'll talk about making ice cream in the future but my revelatin this round was that we really need to let it go in the ice cream maker for a long time so it gets nice and  light.  The main purpose for this batch of strawberries though was to learn how to make strawberry jam.  Our friend Maria, who has made jam in the past that we've got to be the lucky receipants of was nice enough to spend some time with me on Sunday afternoon showing me the "ins and  outs" of jam making 101.  Before you roll your eyes, and think "God, doesn't this girl have enough of things to do already", I have to tell you how easy it is to make your own jam and if you were to do it yourself  you would share the same feelings that I have of "why would I ever want to buy another jar of store bought smuckers when I can make my own out of Valley grown berries". 


I'm not going to share the step by step instructions right now but if it's something that you are interested in doing then please email me and I will pass along the recipe.  In a nutshell, you need to have canning jars that can be easily found at a grocery or hardware store and then they need to be steralized in the dishwasher right before you are ready to use them.  Then you cook down hulled and cleaned strawberries in a large pot with lemon juice and pectin until it all starts to break down before you add sugar to finish it off.  Once it is at the right consistency, it goes into the prepared jars where they are then steralized and sealed for a short period.  Once they come out of the water, they sit in a cool place for 24 hours and then you have your own homemade jam sitting pretty on a shelf.  All in all, after 2-3 hours in the kitchen, I had made 2 batches of strawberry jam that translated into about 6 large and 12 small jars of jam that will be devied out soon for consumption.  This is going to be a repeat project for me throughout the summer because now that I've see how easy it is to do, I ready to conquer strawberry peach and mixed berry once the blueberry season rolls around come July. 



from the pot to the jar





thinking locally...valley made