Showing posts with label preserves. Show all posts
Showing posts with label preserves. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Pickled Ramp Jam


Sometimes, infact a lot of times, great things come from big mistakes (ie: foie gras gojiberry). While trying to use my new pressure canner to preserve my pickled ramps, i overcooked the shit out of them. I am far from an authority of the pressure cooker, i've barely used one in my cooking career. Perhaps i need to cook in kitchen stadium for practice. Anyways, i overcooked the crap out of the first batch. 10 minutes under full pressure, and the brine came out of the jars and it was still boiling nearly 1/2 an hour after being taken out of the canner. Frustrated by my lack of success my first time around, i was determined to not have these guys see the garbage can. No one wants to smell ramps on the sidewalk, especially during a garbage strike. The brownish colour they took on was similar to caramelized onions, and the only thing that stood between the ramps and the bin, was some sugar and the hopes that it would make a great, or atleast interesting jam. In went the sugar, in went the brine and there i was waiting for that perfect consistency. 
I was a tad bit reluctant because these ramps were pickled in a dill pickle style. I was a little unsure of how that flavour would react with a boat load of sugar.
When it was all said and done, i took my first taste. To be honest, i wasn't sure i liked it. It was too unfamiliar of a taste for my taste buds. It wasn't until Colin and Jen, who both loved it, did my taste buds come around and begin to enjoy the unique flavor we had achieved. 
Its tough to describe the flavour, the dill is there, but you'd really only pin point it if i told you it was in there. The consistency is similar to a date in syrup, sticky and toffee like, but with the help of the pressure cooker, the integrity of the ramp shape, despite being overcooked, still help its shape and the perfect consistency for a jam. Jen thinks it would make a perfect accompaniment with the monkfish liver.... we shall see.
The success of this jam gives me a whole new way of thinking towards pickles.... what else could i make in to a jam with that acidic aromatic flavour much different from your typical fruit jam. 
Posted by Grant van Gameren at 9:43 PM 1 comments
Labels: , ,

Sunday, September 7, 2008

Elderberry Juniper


A couple weeks ago i was at a farmers market with my girlfriend and stumbled across a stand with a bunch of freshly picked elderberries. I've only encountered them once before and they were frozen and didn't taste great. Intrigued by the freshness and the possibilities of a nice compote i asked to taste them. They tasted a little bitter but had a unique sweetness to them. e Like a crab apple to the apple, they reminded me of a blueberry's distant cousin. So i snatched up all the stand had to offer, 8 liters or so for 48 bucks. I took them home and sat on them for a couple days as i came up with a pairing i was happy with. I thought about pairing them with another dark berry, something perhaps a little sweeter to balance the astringency of this berry but decided to go another route and showcase the berry with the woodsy flavor of the juniper berry. The recipe was quite simple, the only difficulty is in the balance of berry to sugar to juniper. I didn't want any of them to overpower eachother or for any of the ingredients to get lost in the mix. The berries themselves hold up to some abuse and don't breakdown as easily as a blueberry. With the addition of the right amount of sugar i was able to give it the sweetness the berries needed to help preserve it and make it palatable to ones senses but also displaying the uniqueness of this new favorite preserve. I was a little nervous about the juniper pairing but in the end couldn't get enough of it and I had to can it before I didn't have any left.
I noticed the natural phenomenon of these berries wanting to clump together, which is different from any other berry i've seen. Because of this, i decided to only add a little bit of apple pectin powder to gelify the surrounding syrup rather then reduce it more therefore making the syrup to intense. The apple pectin powder is new to me and im still trying to figure out the amounts to add. Its a little less powerful then the other french stuff i initially started using but i happy with the consistencies it has given me thus far. 

Elderberry Juniper Compote
8 liters fresh elderberries
16 cups sugar
4g ground juniper
16 tbsp lemon juice
16g apple pectin powder


Posted by Grant van Gameren at 5:54 PM 0 comments
Labels:

Monday, September 1, 2008

Strawberry Long Pepper


I managed to get some Ontario strawberries before they went out of season  the other week and although strawberry jam doesn't come to mind when i think about cheese accompaniments, the addition of long pepper gives it a interesting contrast of flavor and complexity. Long pepper is a close relative of black pepper and is cultivated in and around india and indonesia. It is similar in flavor only a little hotter and very floral. Inspired by a sorbet we once did in a restaurant, i decided to try my hand in a simple strawberry jam. I decided to add some cracked black peppercorn as the base with a last minute spike of long pepper. This jam was a three day process to preserve the integrity of the strawberries shape. I started by cleaning the strawberries then taking the weight. i tossed them in the sugar and lemon juice and allowed them to macerate overnight. i then brought them up to a boil, turned off the heat and let them sit in the fridge overnight. The next day i strained the solids and began reducing the liquid. i added the coarse cracked peppercorns at this point to infuse there flavor into the syrup. Be careful not to add to much too early. I added the peppercorn more for a base flavor 
but more so for its visual appearance. Once the syrup was where i wanted it i added the strawberries and the apple pectin and brought it to a simmer for 5 minutes to activate the pectin. I then put the batch, which was a large one, into a 
bus bin and cooled it down a bit before adding the rasped long pepper. In the end i think i cou
ld have upped the long pepper a bit after trying it on a piece of toast and i guess its all depends on personal taste.  

Strawberry Long Pepper Jam
9000g Ontario or local strawberries
4000g sugar
9g coarse cracked black peppercorn
17g apple pectin powder
1 tbsp ground long pepper
juice of 8 lemons. 

Posted by Grant van Gameren at 8:41 AM 0 comments
Labels:

Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Peach Lavender Preserve

I have done a decent amount of compotes, jellies and pickles in the kitchen, but never really taken a stab at preserving in mason jars the old fashion way. I've either made just enough to last in a deli container or been lucky enough to have a vac pac machine. Come to think about it, this is the first time i've really used pectin. I've always been used to using agar agar or gelatin to set things. My minds been going in a million different directions these days, finishing up my last month at my current restaurant and preparing for this new venture its been hard to focus on any one thing. While walking through kensington this weekend i saw some beautiful ontario peaches. Not as nice as the ones from the farmers market earlier in the week, but nice enough to try my hand in preserving. So i picked up a box and brought in home. 
As I perused my Small Batch Preserving book i came across an interesting pairing of peach and lavender. Then i dug deeper into the world of preserving and read up on the process, the tools, the ingredient (pectin) all so new to me. Seemed easy enough. So i made several trips to the hardware store and local dollerama, determined to preserve those peaches that night. Picked up a box of certa pectin and i was ready to commence. What i thought was to be an easy process wasn't as so. First off the recipe used much more sugar then i felt comfortable using. I thought to myself i was trying to preserve the flavor of peaches for another season, not to taste sugar. I know sugar acts as a preservative, but in my mind it was way to much. So i diced up the peaches, cooked it out for a few minutes with the sugar, lemon juice, and infused lavender "stock" and added my pouch of certa. Mind you the recipes always ask for a package of powder or liquid pectin, but fail to state what brand or in what quantity. After completing the process, i filled up my mason jars, submerged then under boiling water for 10 minutes and took them off to cool for 24 hours unfortunately they didn't gel up like i would have wanted. Right away i was turned off from certa. So i contacted a pastry chef and found a good quality french powdered pectin, unfortunately they informed me that preserving was a touch and go process and there was a ton of variables (pectin contact of fruit, ripeness, etc... ), but i was determined to write my first recipe and acheive a useable product. I also think it will be easier if i pick one type of pectin and stick to it. So i diced the peaches, added the sugar, lemon juice, and lavender stock, again. Weighed out my pectin at one gram per 100 grams of pulp(in this case the weight of peaches) added a touch of sugar to help minimize the clumping as i diluted the pectin in enough water (about a 1/2 cup) . It gelled up right away and had clumps. i took a hand blender and smoothed it out. I then added this to the peach mixture and boiled it out for several minutes. And as quickly as it started, it was finished. I did three batches, same recipe. the first one i kept the peaches in there diced state, another i strained a bit of the liquid off and blended the peaches smooth, and the third one i really brought down and caramelized. The caramelized batch was too stiff. My guess is i didn't change the amount of pectin to take into account the extra water loss. I just thinned it out with some water till it reached a nice consistency and bottled it. 
Attempt #2 a success!

Peach Lavender Jam 
900 gr small diced peaches (approx 4 cups)
730 gr white sugar
2 tbsp lemon juice
9 gr powdered pectin 
2 tbsp dried lavender 
1/2 cup boiling water
extra water for diluting the pectin. about 1/2 cup
Posted by Grant van Gameren at 7:44 AM 0 comments
Labels:
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)