In a jam

I've always been a bit afraid of making jam...something about hot, sticky, sputtering fruit all over my kitchen I guess. But a while ago I ended up with a quart of fresh black currants from my CSA and didn't quite know what to do with them. I had never even seen fresh currants before, and they're beautiful fruits, but so tart you just can't eat them raw. I found a number of recipes on the internet for making black currant booze, but I was hesitant about wasting all that fruit if it didn't turn out, let alone all that vodka, so I decided to suck it up and make some jam last night and it turned out great!

Here's the recipe...this jam is quick and super easy and can be made with any fruit, not just currants. Enjoy!

Ingredients:
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp. water
1 cup currants

Directions:
- combine sugar and water in a small saucepan over medium heat
- when sugar has melted, add the berries and turn up to high heat
- once it reaches a boil, boil for 5 minutes
- remove from heat and cool completely, and store in a jar in the fridge

I plan on eating the jam with scones and clotted cream this weekend. If anyone has a good (easy) recipe for scones...post it in the comments section!

Dig a little deeper

Want to learn more about where the food in the grocery store comes from, how it's made and how it gets there?

We have a tonne of resources in our library that can tell you. We just today received Michael Pollan's "In Defense of Food". You can also find all of Michael Pollan's other books in our collection.

Find more books on where your food comes from, how to grow it yourself and even how to get cooking on our Eat Local display in the library. Or check out Bill Mollison's Global Gardener or The Power of Community from the film collection to get your own food revolution started.