BERRIES AND CURRANTS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 22, Issue 551, 13 January 1950, Page 22

BERRIES AND CURRANTS

ESIDES the delect@ble sweet B dishes which we can make with strawberries, raspberries, red and black currants, there are jams and jellies to be considered, before the fruit gets too ripe. Also we must remember cherries which are delightful bottled in syrup. Bottled Cherries : Leave the stones-they give a delicious almond flavour. Make the usual syrup of 1% Ib. sugar to 1 pint water, put over low heat first and stir till dissolved, then boil 3-5 minutes and cool. Fill jars with cherries, cover with cooled syrup to % inch from top. Seal and sterilise in waterbath. Start with cold water, bring slowly to simmering point, and keep at that for 10 minutes. Remove from bath and stand out of draught. If cherries are inclined to be hard,, try this second method. Make syrup of % lb, sugar to 1 pint water. Heat. cherries and syrup in saucepan, and bring to boil slowly. Allow cherries to remain in this syrup overnight? Next day, put the fruit in clean hot jars, boil the syrup and fill jars to within 1 inch of top, and heat in oven for 30 minutes on low. Finish as usual. Red and Black Currants Black currants are especially valuable for their vitamin C content. They may be bottled in plain water or syrup, or pulped and strained as puree. Now that it is possible to use any shape or size of jar for bottling; do let us preserve more fruit instead of making it all into jam. It is both healthful and useful to have our own bottled fruit to use all abel the year. Bottled Fruit Salad A most attractive fruit salad is made by bottling equal quantities of such fruits as red currants, raspberries, strawberries and cherries. Pack the fruit in layers, cover with cooled syrup, and sterilise as usual in waterbath. Bring slowly to simmering point and keep on this for 10 minutes. Remove and stand out of draught. Loganberries Bottle these in syrup like raspberries. They retain their shape and colour well. Pick just before fully ripe. If there seems to be any tiny grubs or maggots, as there are in some seasons,’ put into weak solution for 4% hour (1 teaspoon common salt-to 1 pint water). This applies to raspberries, too. The grubs come out and can be cleared away. ‘Mulberries These make good jam, and are also excellent bottled in syrup and used for tarts, They may be combined with apple slices. Pick before fully ripe, as they tend to get very squashy. Setting Berry Jams Strawberry, raspberry, cherry, or marrow jam (any fruit which contains little or no acid), may be made to set by adding tartaric or citric acid, about

level teaspoonful of acid to 2 Ib. fruit. Add it to fruit before putting in sugar. Lemon juice serves the same purpose and adds flavour--not more than 1 lemon to 2 Ib. fruit, or flavour will be too strong. You may also make a pectin from sour and under-ripe apples, and add this to berry jam to make it set. Just boil cut-up apples, skins and cores included,’ to pulp, with a little water, strain through muslin, boil again, bottle and seal, Black Currant Jam To 4 Ib. fruit allow 5 Ib, sugar and 3 pints water. Bring fruit to the boil with water, and simmer till tender, which may take % hour. When really soft, add warmed sugar, stir till thoroughly dissolved, bring back to boiling point and boil fast 10-15 minutes or until a little will set when tested on cold plate. Sugarless Jams An English authority gives these directions ‘for making sugarless. jams for diabetics. Take any jam recipe and follow it so far as cooking the fruit and allowing a proportion of water goes, For instance, with raspberries where no water is necessary, put fruit in pan and heat slowly. till juices flow. The same when making blackberry jam. With damsons put 14 pint water with 3 Ib. damsons and cook the fruit till tender, But for sugarless jams it is wise to reduce the bulk of fuit cooked till 2/3rds only of original quantity remains. Then, to every pound of fruit, allow 16 saccharine tablets (0.3 grains each) and 42 oz. gelatine. Crush saccharine to a powder, dissolve gelatine in a little water and add this to the jam, giving a good 3tir for about 2 minutes, making sure no lumps are formed. Meantime have ‘clean jars in oven getting hot. Put your jam in these, seal and cover at once, then sterilise in same way as when fruitbottling by the water method, otherwise jam will not keep. Half an hour’s sterilisation is considered sufficient. Three Fruit Jelly Two pounds black currants, 2 Ib. red currants, 1 lb, raspberries. Put into pan with just enough water to cover. Bring slowly to boil and simmer gently till thoroughly cooked. Put in jelly bag and. leave to drip al] night. Next day put cup for cup sugar (1 Ib. sugar to each pint juice). Bring quickly to the boil when) sugar is dissolved, and boil slowly for 15 minutes, or till will set.