Strawberry Jam with Vanilla Bean

It's is, at long last, Jam time again! These berry gems are soon to be jeweled jam wonder in a jar.

Except this time I'm doing a little something I haven't ever done before. I'm adding a split vanilla bean to the fruit while it cooks.

I actually chopped up strawberries to make 10 cups, added 2 cups of sugar, threw in a split vanilla bean (not scraped), stirred it all up and let it macerate for about 5 hours. (I went to see The Great Gatsby in the theater in the mean time. Great movie, I very highly recommend it. I saw the 3D version. Beautiful...)

Now about vanilla beans: I had always boycotted them. They were freaking outrageously expensive. $10-$20 for 2 vanilla beans? I ask you...what in heaven's name makes them think they can charge this kind of money for a flavoring ingredient? Especially when there's very nice high quality vanilla extract that will last you so much longer? People work hard for their money! And all these recipes that call for it. It just made me sad. But...for this, I gave in. For this, since I'm making a yield of something that will last my family for months, I decided I would spend the money. I was not disappointed.

I boiled the whole fruit for 15 minutes (along with the zest and juice of one large lemon), used an emersion blender to puree most (but not all!!) of the fruit, and then added 2 packets of liquid pectin. I boiled it for 10 more minutes, and all along the process skimmed off the foam.

 

You can see the vanilla bean seeds there on the side of my pot. Lovely. BTW I discarded the vanilla pod just before I used my emersion blender.

Into the jars they went and I processed them for 20 minutes. 20 minutes is correct...for me. I live at a high altitude. Many people don't know this but if you live at high altitudes you have to process longer or your jars won't seal (because of the lower boiling point.) At my altitude I have to process for 10 minutes longer than what is called for in the recipe. How do I know this? I followed the table provided by Ball in the back of my "Complete Book Of Home Preserving." But you can also refer to this site.

I removed the jars and placed them on a cooling rack. As I sit and write this, I just heard them "ping." Exciting.

 

Finished product. Perfect!

This recipe was adapted from Food In Jars, one of my favorite sites for canning tips and recipes. Get the recipe here.

 

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Tomatos Day 1...Finally

Here are my tomatoes on Day 1. I actually planted them last evening but this is their first day in their new home. I didn't do seedlings this year because of the late frosts. I wanted something more established and acclimated...and ready to go! Last year was such a failure with no fruits until just before the frost...most of which were still green when it did snow. I'm hoping to add plants to my garden one by one each payday so that by August it will be a glorious colorful therapeutic garden. Maybe even July.
I also decided to plant in containers so that I can control the soil environment a little better...and I can take my garden with me if we have to move. (We rent...you never know.)
Here's my tomatoes today:

"Park's Whopper" Big ol' beefsteak.

"Better Boy" Supposed to be very hearty and produces a lot of fruit.

"Husky Cherry Red" and "Sun Gold" both of which are cherry tomato size. I planted them in the same large pot to see if they would kind of grow intertwined with each other. May have been a mistake. We'll see.

OK so I have some weeding to do. In the front there...among the weeds is my glorious mint that comes back each year. It will cover the front of the pots. It's about 10:45 in the morning so that one on the left isn't getting its sun yet...but it will get lots of very hot sun in the afternoons.
Anyway, I better get to weeding...

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