Apricot Jam

I put up my first batches of Blenheim apricot jam last week, and even in the bad iphone photo, ABOVE, you can see how gorgeous it was. The Blenheim is an heirloom variety that sprouted from a pit planted at England's Blenheim Palace, home to the Dukes of Marlborough, some time before the 1830s. For a while it was named the Shipley, after the gardener's daughter who tended the seedling, but eventually the statlier name stuck. Either way, everyone agreed that it was one of best apricots grown. (Although in Mansfield Park, Jane Austen celebrates the Moor Park apricot, the offspring of another aristocratic estate.)

The Blenheim was extraordinary but not quite unique, being nearly identical to another apricot first grown in Paris and known as the Royal, a name the French gave to the very finest fruit reserved for the king's table. (See the post below about Duke cherries.) In the 20th century, both the Blenheim and Royal were widely cultivated in California, although the democratic citizens of our state lost track of the distinction between a Duke and a King so the catch-all name Royal Blenheim was applied to both types. Everyone still agreed that they were the tastiest apricots grown, but the Blenheim/Royal became scarce in recent decades because the fruit was highly perishable and growers ripped up the fine old trees to make way for newer varieties that produced fruit firm enough to ship to the East Coast. Taste was a secondary consideration, with results that you already know. Which is why, I'd guess, apricots are less esteemed today than they once were. In Shakespeare's Midsummer's Night Dream, Titiana fed her beloved Bottom mulberries, figs and apricots—a lover's banquet of the most erotically delicious fruit.

This Blenheim apricot jam would live up to Titiana's expectations. When I gave one of my few jars of precious boysenberry jam to someone the other day, I said teasingly, "This is basically a declaration of love." Then I gave the same person a jar of Blenheim jam. "And this," I said, "is a seduction."

The recipe below will work with any apricot variety.

Classic Apricot Jam

3 1/2 pound apricots

2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

3 cups sugar

1  Pit and quarter the apricots. Put them in a non-reactive mixing bowl with the sugar and lemon juice. Stir well to combine, then set aside to macerate for 30 minutes.

2  Pour the fruit-sugar mixture into a wide preserving pan and bring to a boil over high heat. Stirring constantly, cook at a full boil until the jam thickens, about 15 to 20 minutes depending on the size of your pot and the strength of your stove's flame. (A very broad pot on a strong flame will reduce faster because the large surface area allows water to evaporate more quickly—cooking fruit into jam is simply a matter of boiling off excess water and concentrating sugars.) Test for doneness by spooning a bit of hot jam onto a chilled saucer. Place the saucer in the freezer for 1 minute. When it's cool, push your finger through the jam, which should cling to the plate with a luscious, thick consistency. Don't worry about trying to get a firm gel set. I think apricot jam is best when it mounds in a spoon but drips through the tines of a fork.

3  Ladle the hot jam into prepared half-pint jars, leaving 1/4" headspace. (Prepared means washed, dried and warmed in a 200 degree oven.) Seal the jars and process in a boiling-water bath for 10 minutes. (Start timing only after the water in the canner has returned to a full boil.) Allow the jars to cool on the counter overnight.

Yields about 3 pints

Rare Citrus

In southern California, spring is already giving way to summer: there are tomatoes and melons in the market. But today in Santa Monica, there was also plenty of late-season citrus to be found, including these rarities from Mud Creek.

The top fruit is—can you guess?—a lemon that's suffering an indentity crises. It's normal in shape, size and taste, but due to a mutation caused by cosmic rays or something of that sort, the mother tree produces orange fruit. That kind of thing isn't unusual in the citrus clan. The pink Cara-Cara orange is a mutant sport off of a Washington Navel orange, which was itself a mutant sport discovered in Brazil in the 1870s. The UC Riverside Citrus Variety Collection has a mutant lemon with a variegated green rind and pink flesh—it's a pink lemonade tree.

The other four fruits are limettas, also known as sweet lemons because they are generally acidless. But not these Marrakech limettas (Limonettes de Marrakech), which are anomalous in being quite acidic. (Thanks to David Karp for the ID and info.)  

I think I'll use the orange lemons and limettas to make a late-season rare-lemon marmalade. Stay tuned for the taste test. UPDATE: The marmalade is pale orange and the limettas have something of the flavor and fragrance of bergamots. 

Cherry Splatters

Making cherry jam is messy work. My kitchen looked like a murder scene with red splatters. But delicious results.

 

Duke Cherries

On Wednesday at the Santa Monica Farmers Market, I got a hot tip from Akasha, who had heard it from David Karp, aka the Fruit Detective. The rumor was that there would be a few sour cherries at the Sunday Hollywood Market. "You better get there at 7:30," warned Akasha. That's half an hour before the market officially opens, so this morning I woke up at 6:30, and I had just parked in Hollywood when Akasha and Alan pulled up.

"We must be crazy," she said, and Alan nodded in agreement. "By the way, Alan, happy father's day."

He rolled his eyes.

The three of us wandered into the otherwise empty market, where you could have fired a cannonball down Ivar without hitting a shopper. The farmers were still unpacking. Akasha and I were moving fast, scanning the stalls as we went. We flew by farmer James Birch without breaking pace. We were in a mad dash.

The reason for our cherry madness was the complete failure of the sour cherry crop at Cherry Tyme in the Leona Valley. Cherry Tyme is the only sour cherry orchard in California, and Akasha and I have picked there for the past two years. This year, however, the crop was hurt by a late frost and then totally destroyed by an invading army of ground squirrels. The couple who run the place emailed to say there's nothing left to pick. Their discouragement was so deep that they may never reopen. The news was, as they say in California, a total bummer.

Which is why David Karp's tip got Akasha and me out of bed at a ridiculous hour for a Sunday.

At last we found the secret cherry vendor occupying the literal last stall at the market. She had barely started to unpack.

"Do you have sour cherries," asked Akasha, breathless.

"Not many," said the farmer.

"We'll take whatever you've got," I said.

Her supply was pitifully modest, only 2 pounds of what were probably Montmorency. Akasha and I agreed to split them.

"It's better than nothing," she said.

But the big surprise was yet to come. A few minutes later in another part of the market we ran into David Karp, who didn't care that we'd gotten the last sour cherries because he'd ferreted out something even rarer from the same vendor. David gave one to Akasha--a medium-sized, medium-red, heart-shaped cherry--then hesitated as if unsure that I was worthy to taste one. I had a millisecond to plead my case.

"Is it a Duke?," I blurted out. David looked astonished. I'd guessed the secret password, and he gave me one. 

"Are there any more?," I asked.

"There's only one pound left," he said. "Hurry."

But I was already running back to the cherry vendor to buy the last of her Dukes. Before that moment, I didn't really believe that Dukes existed, because one hardly ever even reads about them, and then only as an aside in a footnote buried deep in some specialized treatise on cherries. Apparently the fruit is an antique French variety that may be a cross between a sweet cherry and a sour cherry. It originated in the Médoc, although English fans of the fruit chewed over the name of its homeland until all that was left was May Duke—Duke for short. The French name, Royale, suggests its favored status among all cherries, and Thomas Jefferson, an orchard connoisseur, planted it at Monticello.

Today I'm here to affirm that the cherry is delicious, whatever you call it. The Duke, situated at 12 o'clock in the picture ABOVE, resembles both types of cherry species to a degree but neither one exactly. The flavor is full, like a sweet cherry, but the flesh is paler than the skin and highly acidic, like a sour cherry. I think it's going to make a spectacular jam.

Read about Dukes and the rest of the refined cherry clan in my upcoming book, Saving the Season: a Handbook for Home Canning, Pickling and Preserving. I'm copyediting the manuscript now, and it will be published by Knopf next spring. 

Canning Labels

Here at Saving the Season, I don't accept advertisements and I don't do any quid pro quo endorsements. So you can trust me when I say that I really like Felix Doolittle stationary. (Oprah and Martha also like it.) Felix's new line of canning labels, BELOW, are some of the most attractive I've seen, and when he sent word of his upcoming Memorial Day sale, I thought the news was worth sharing.

Felix actually does a whole line of kitchen labels—for bakers and chefs as well as preservers—in a variety of shapes and styles. The shop is near Boston but the collection is sold online at www.felixdoolittle.com.

Spring

Spring is time for strawberry-rhubarb jam.

Cabbage

For sauerkraut.