Tutti fruitti!

The preserving season is definitely in full swing! Last weekend I made some raspberry jam and a new jam for jillicious!; Tutti fruitti jam. The photo below illustrates the ingredients nicely....!


It's chock a block full of strawberries, blackcurrants, raspberries and redcurrants from Rectory Farm (where else?!) and may even count as 4 of your 5 a day* ..... Try it on toast, scones, or in the middle of a Victoria sponge cake.

* although perhaps that is a bit optimistic!

New arrivals!

It's been a long time since I've updated this blog.....I've still been preserving, just not shouting about it as much!

The marmalades are just about sold out, and we're onto early summer fruits and vegetables. Thanks to Ruth and Laura, who both donated some rhubarb so that I could make some Spring rhubarb relish! There doesn't seem to have been as much rhubarb around as last year (our rhubarb patch is looking a bit sorry for itself this year!) but I do have a handful of jars of rhubarb relish for sale. This relish was popular last year, especially with people who don't like onions, as it is onion-free!

Rectory Farm has been my source of strawberries and beetroot again this year.

The strawberries I used were 'Sonata' a mid-season variety, which were very tasty (well, obviously I had to check to make sure that they tasted good enough to make jam with!).

There's something quite satisfying about walking up and down the rows of beetroot at Rectory Farm, choosing which ones you like and pulling them out of the ground! My beetroot relish was made with fresh beetroot that I harvested the same day (can't get much fresher than that!) and is made to a recipe that my grandma gave me. It's lovely with cheeses or cold meats and again was popular last year, with reports of people even eating it straight from the jar (Good grief!). Some people even told me that they don't usually like beetroot, but were converted to die hard beetroot eaters after trying some of this relish.

Prices for the jars are £2.20 per jar, or two for £4.00. I should be able to maintain these prices, if everyone continues to return their empty jars to me. (and thank you to those who have been doing so!) This means my costs are reduced, you receive 20p off your next purchase for each jar returned and we all have a warm feeling inside as we're doing our bit towards re-using and recycling. Everyone's a winner!

Marvellous marmalades!

All has been quiet on the jillicious! front for a while, but I have been busy over the past few weeks, making marmalade while Seville oranges are in season. The gorgeous orangey smells coming from the jam pan have been the perfect antidote to those symptoms of January-itis (being sleepy-headed and generally grumpy!) and having a jar of marmalade ("sunshine in a jar") on the breakfast table will really lift your spirits. Apart from all that of course, it tastes bloomin' marvellous!

I've made several different types of marmalade, some the same as last year and a couple of new ones....

• Medium cut Seville orange marmalade - does exactly as it says on the tin!


• Chunky Seville orange marmalade - my favourite type - big chunks of peel and a beautiful amber colour. (Warning: this marmalade is not for the faint hearted or those of you who like dainty slivers of peel and lots of jelly in your marmalade...)


• Wakey wakey! Seville orange and ginger marmalade - Seville orange marmalade with slivers of crystalised ginger. Puts a bit of a zing into breafast!


• Rise and shine! Seville orange, blood orange and pink grapefruit - Seville orange is still the main fruit, so the grapefruit and lemon aren't overpowering but can still be tasted. Yum!


• Seville orange and lemon marmalade - A lovely refreshing marmalade, paler in colour than the others and thinner cut.


• Seville orange, pink grapefruit and lemon marmalade - Another thinner cut marmalade, and a softer set, with lots of citrussy flavours.


• Dark Seville orange marmalade - This marmalade is darker, as a quarter of the sugar content is soft brown sugar rather than granulated ywhite sugar. This means that it has more of a rich treacley taste and is a little less sweet than the others...and v tasty!

The prices and availability are on the right hand side of this post, so let me know if you'd like to order any! (jill.mceachern@ntlworld.com)

Happy New Year!

Just wanted to say Happy New Year to everyone and thanks to those who have supported my jillicious! venture over the past year.

Hope you all had a good Christmas (mine was jam-packed (ho ho) with family, food and pressies!) and that you all have a happy and healthy (and preserve filled....!) 2011.

Jill x

Crab apples

I can remember that when I was younger my mum (or grandma, can't remember which!) used to make crab apple jelly, which we ate on thinly sliced white bread and butter. When I started up jillicious! earlier on this year, my sister mentioned that she remembered eating crab apple jelly when she was younger, and how tasty it was. I promised her that I'd try to get my hands on some crab apples and see what I could do...

So when we were chatting to our newly-introduced neighbours Anthony and Sue during the summer, and they told us that a gorgeous tree in their back garden was a crab apple tree, my eyes lit up! The tree was covered in rosy red and orange fruit.... and I mean covered! So a trip round to Anthony and Sue's later and I was the proud owner of 2 massive bags of crab apples! (Thank you Anthony and Sue!)


With Anthony and Sue's crab apples I made a few jars of spiced crab apple jelly, and a few jars of bramble and crab apple jelly. The former is cooked with cloves and cinnamon and as crab apples make a rose-coloured jelly, it is both spiced and pretty! The bramble and crab apple jelly takes on the colour of the brambles, so is a dark purple colour, and has a lovely flavour...bramble jelly with a bit of a bite!

Our friends Laura and Tom brought us a big galvanised pail full of crab apples from their garden a couple of months later, and with their crab apples I made crab apple and quince jelly and spiced crab apple and plum jelly. The crab apple and quince has a lovely flavour, slightly perfumed from the quince. The flavour of the spiced plum and crab apple jelly reminds me a bit of Christmas and mulled wine (yum!) and I reckon the gorgeous colour of the jelly is just the kind of uplifting sight you need at breakfast time this time of year!

See what I mean?!

I would eat these jellies on toast or bread and butter, as a sweet preserve but I think that they would probably go just as well with cheese and biscuits too. Why don't you try them and decide for yourself?

Autumn colours

I've come to the conclusion over the past few months that I'm a bit of a tree hugger (which is no bad thing!). There is something to be said for the feeling of happiness that I get when I see a beautiful flower, a sun dappled English hedgerow or a fruit laden-tree. We went to Batsford Arboretum in Gloucestershire a couple of weekends ago, and the autumn colours of the trees there were just breathtaking...... I read a couple of weeks ago that it's the British weather conditions that dictate the strength of the autumn colours. Bright, sunny autumn days and cold, but not freezing, nights with low levels of rainfall are what's needed for a vibrant display of reds, oranges and yellows.

The BBC website explains how the weather we've had this year has also led to a huge crop of hedgerow fruits like brambles, wild plums, rosehips and sloes. The weather this year has been that of extremes; the coldest winter in 30 years, the first late spring since 1976, a heatwave in late June and the coldest August in 17 years. Despite this though, because the 10-12 week period between May and early July was relatively frost free, the trees all had time to flower, be pollinated and set well with fruit.

Happy days! Let's hope next year will have equally as gorgeous tree colours and another bumper wild fruit harvest!

Sloe gin and damson brandy!

We went on a fab Autumn Foraging course in September, run by Woodland Ways (I would definitely recommend their courses!) It was a gorgeous sunny day, with blue skies and we foraged to our heart's content in the beautiful Oxfordshire countryside. As well as learning about British trees and plants, we found some of these....

some of these........

and lots of these.....

which are sloes, and along with gin and sugar, make sloe gin. The blackthorn bushes were full of the things, and we picked a big bag to bring home and make into sloe gin... Happy days! I stuck the sloes in the freezer until I had time to make up the gin.....guess what the plan is for this weekend..?!

So I've dug my sloe gin recipe out, which, incidentally can be used for other fruits and other spirits, such as damsons, plums or cherries and vodka or brandy; damson brandy is my other favourite (and my mum's!). You can use this basic recipe and amend the ingredients according to the fruit and spirits you want to use. So here goes....

400g fruit (sloes, damsons, plums or cherries)

710ml alcohol (gin, brandy or vodka)

350g sugar.

Make sure that the fruit is dry and remove any stems. Stick the fruit in the freezer overnight (or longer if necessary - doesn't seem to do them any harm!), this will avoid the need to prick each of the fruits with a fork (which can be a very fiddly task with little sloes!)

Put the sloes into a large clean jar, kilner jar or the bottle that the alcohol came in, if the neck is wide enough! Pour the sugar on top of the sloes, and then cover with the alcohol (you might need to use several containers to use up all of the ingredients.)

Replace the lid on the container and give it a bit of a shake, to start to dissolve the sugar, and continue to shake once a day until the sugar looks dissolved. Put the containers into a dark place for about three months.

After that time, strain the sloe gin through a coffee filter placed onto a sieve and use a funnel to pour the alcohol into sterlised bottles. The recipe makes about 800ml of sloe gin.

The alcohol becomes quite liqueur-y, so sloe gin is much sweeter than neat gin and thankfully damson brandy tastes nothing like neat brandy (yuck!). I drink the damson brandy neat and prefer the sloe gin mixed with tonic water.

Get making now and you'll have home made pressies ready in time for Christmas. Hurrah!

Oh and I just thought I'd post this photo, as it's so cheery especially with autumn weather approaching! Something else we found on the foraging course....