My trip to Las Vegas for my mom’s 80th birthday was exactly as I wanted it to be; Relaxing, Fun, and most of all, away from the stresses of work. As the week comes to close and I have to say my goodbyes I leave here giving both my sister and mom some much needed personal attention and even got around to teaching them a few recipes that were easy and they enjoyed.
I made scones* for my mom and my sister and left my sister with a ready made quart jar of dry ingredients to have in the pantry when she needed to whip up a batch for one of her many social gatherings. I made my 4 ingredient bread for my mom with dinner one night and it was a hit with the whole family. On Wednesday my older sister Cheryl was very excited to have me at her house most of the day working on canning up her oranges, cranberries and other citrus.
Over the course of the morning we made Cranpineacot Jam, Cranberry Orange Marmalade and Trifecta Citrus Marmalade. All were delicious out of the pot and Cheryl tasted at least two with her much loved homemade currant scones. Unfortunately I only have the memories, pictures and recipes to take home since we flew over rather than drove and bringing jars back is a pain. The ingredients were easy to get now in season, other than the frozen cranberries, so I will make a few jars when I get time next week. The Trifecta Citrus Marmalade recipe will follow in the next post.
Cranpineacot Jam
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups frozen or fresh cranberries (thaw frozen before use)
- 5 oz dried apricots, chopped (3/4 cup chopped)
- 1 pc. medium fresh pineapple, peeled, cut with no core or 15 oz can of dicedpineapple (including juice)
- 3 cups cane sugar
Instructions
Preparation:
- Prepare 4 halfpint jars, lids, and rings. Sterilize the jars and keep them in the hot watertill its time for processing.
Cooking:
- Cooking: Combine the pineapple andapricots in a food processor or blender and pulse till they are finely diced.
- Add these two ingredients to an enameled dutch oven or stainless steel pot andcook on medium heat for 15 minutes. Turn off the heat, cover and let set foranother 15 minutes.
- Add cranberries tothe pineapple mixture and heat on high till mixture comes to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, stirringoccasionally, for 20 minutes until most of the cranberries have popped and aretender.
- Add the sugar and simmer for another 10 minutes. Turn off the heat andfill jars. The cranberries are full of pectin and should naturally thicken therecipe.
Filling the jars:
- On adishtowel place your hot jars in a semi circle leaving room for your pot thathas your jam recipe.
- Using your funnel in each jar ladle the mixture intothe jars leaving 1/4” headspace. Remove air bubbles and refill to theproper headspace if necessary.
- Taking a clean papertowel wet it with warm waterand wipe the rims of the jars removing any food particles that would interferewith a good seal.
- Using your magic wand to extract the lids from the hot waterand place them on the now cleaned rims. Add your rings to the tops of each ofthe jars and turn to seal just "finger tight".
Processing:
- Make sure yourrack is on the bottom of the canner and place the jars in the water bath makingsure that the water covers each of the jars by 1 to 2 inches. Add hot water tothe canner if it doesn't measure up.
- Cover the pot and turn up the heat underthe canner and wait for the water to start boiling. Once the water has come toa boil start your timer for 10 minutes.
- When complete turn off the heat andremove the cover and let the jars sit for another few minutes.
- Remove the jarsand place them back on the dishtowel in a place that they will sit overnight tocool. Do not touch or move them till the next morning.
Sealing:
- Some time in thenext hour your jars will be making a "pinging" or "popping"noise. That is the glass cooling and the reaction of the lids being sucked intothe jar for proper sealing. Some recipes may take overnight to seal. Check yourlids and reprocess any jars that did not seal.
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