Fresh picked strawberry

One of the reasons why we decided to move to the Pacific Northwest is because of the great investment made into local agriculture up here. When we visited here in October 2007, still as New Yorkers, we immediately fell in love with the grapefruit-sized onions, the sweet crunchy apples and the flavorful tomatoes. After that trip we probably spent hours fantasizing about being able to hop into a car and go buy farm fresh fruits and veggies straight from the source. Don’t ever let anyone tell you that dreams don’t come true, because this last weekend we went and picked about 8 or 9 pounds of fresh strawberries from a farm about an hour and a half north of us.

Picking strawberries

It was a beautiful day – a little cool, but not too cool, and luckily we didn’t have to compete with too many people.

Unpicked strawberries

There were so many gorgeous strawberries, and the smell of them was intoxicating. After picking them for about half an hour, our hands were stained pink and red and the smell of the berries lingered even after we left.

When you pick so many strawberries – or any berry for that matter – you really have to have a pretty immediate plan for their fate. Strawberries begin to break down in the hours after being picked, so it’s wise to try to use them the same day that you pick them or to use them the next day at the latest. Among the obvious things you can do with strawberries, like making fresh strawberry shortcake or strawberry lemonade, you can also freeze them for later use in smoothies, desserts and sauces. But one thing that I had never done, yet I have always wanted to do, was make strawberry freezer jam.

Freezer jam has always appealed to me because it doesn’t require cooking the fruit or boiling the jars. It’s a much faster process than traditional canning, and you store your jam in the freezer and refrigerator instead of your cabinet (so make sure you have room). Even though I knew it was supposed to be pretty easy, I had no idea how simple and easy it was until I did it. It’s beyond easy! It’s so simple that your kids can do this – and probably without your help. I’m completely sold on freezer jam and you can bet I’ll be making other kinds as other fruits are ready to harvest over the next few months.

Strawberry Freezer Jam
This recipe is taken from the back of the Ball Instant Fruit Pectin package – my recommendation is that you start off using the recipe off of your pectin product, and then experiment once you’re comfortable. One of the primary reasons for this is because there are different pectin products – low sugar, liquid, powder, instant, etc. – and some call for very little sugar or a lot of sugar. Get comfortable then experiment.

• 4 cups crushed or pureed strawberries (tops removed, and cleaned)
• 1 1/2 cups vegan sugar
• 1 1.59-ounce package Ball Instant Fruit Pectin (this is a no cook version)
• 5 or 6 8-ounce freezer or jelly jars (or you can probably use 3 pint jars)

First make sure you have clean jars. Even though these came sealed from the store, I still ran the jars through the dishwasher and washed the lids by hand. Also have your chosen pectin on hand – again, follow the recipe off of the package.

Canning jars and pectin

After you have washed and trimmed your strawberries, place them into a large bowl and with a potato masher mash the strawberries. Alternatively you can puree them if you do not like your jam to have chunks of fruit in them. Either way, make sure you have four cups of mashed or pureed strawberries.

Mashing the strawberries

In a separate bowl mix together the sugar and pectin. Since this recipe is instant, I do not have to boil the pectin on the stove.

Then combine the sugar and pectin with the mashed strawberries.

Nearly there!

Once everything is well combined, start ladling the mixture into your jars.

Finishing up the jam!

Just three more jars to go...

Put the lids on once you’re done. Let sit for half an hour, then stick them all in the freezer.

My very first strawberry freezer jam!

The jam will last for one year in the freezer and three weeks in the refrigerator. It’s a good idea to write the date on the lid of your jar so down the road you’ll know how much time is left to consume your jam.

Make sure to add today's date to your jam

And of course, I had to try my strawberry jam right away, so I made a nice, warm batch of biscuits. It tastes amazing! It’s very sweet, but a perfect balance with that morning toast or bread, and it’s not too runny. Some people might prefer a thicker jam, so you may either want to experiment with different brands of pectin or do a little bit of internet research to see what brands will yield a thicker recipe.

Mmmmm....

The biggest win for me, though – and as corny as this sounds – is that it tasted like freedom to me. Why? Because I have never in my life made jam before and I feel as though I’ve added another category of food to the “I can make that!” column. I’ve always bought it, and as much as I love the taste of a good quality store-bought (or farm-bought) jam, nothing compares to your own. I’m now able to both support my local farms and make something that I can truly call my own. It’s a sweet, sweet victory for me!

Have you ever made freezer jam, or any kind of jam for that matter? If so, what is your favorite kind?

This is yet another post in my series of how to save money in the kitchen. I haven’t priced out how much this costs this time, because this is more about making do with what you have. If you have these few ingredients on hand or others (like grapes or other berries of some kind), it can be very inexpensive to make. Cheers!

Last weekend was our first official hot weekend of Spring. It was the kind of weekend where the air was sticky and warm, and where we wished that we had gone ahead and put in the air conditioners (no central AC for us). It was also a weekend where we thanked ourselves for having all the right ingredients to create a drink that was exactly what we needed: cool and refreshing.

I have to give my husband credit for this drink, because he had made it a few days prior (thanks for the idea, husband!).

Strawberry Lemonade

• 1 lemon, juiced
• 1 lime, juiced
• 6 – 10 strawberries, trimmed and sliced
• Agave nectar and/or stevia
• Water, cold
• Ice

Put ice into a pitcher. I filled our pitcher with probably about two or two and a half cups of ice.

Juice your lemon and lime straight into the pitcher.

Add the chopped strawberries to the pitcher.

Add sweetener to taste. My husband prefers to use stevia, which is a natural sweetener sans the sugar. You can purchase stevia as a powder or as an extract like this:

As you can see in the next picture, there are 1,440 servings in this little bottle, but we like our drinks sweet so we tend to use more than two drops a serving.

In this recipe I probably put about two full droppers of stevia liquid in the pitcher.

Next fill up the rest of the pitcher with water, and then stir everything together.

Let your pitcher of water sit for about 10 or 15 minutes prior to serving to let the flavor of the strawberries seep into the drink. You can also omit the ice if you won’t be serving immediately and let it sit for a few hours in your refrigerator. It will gradually turn a pinkish color and the strawberry flavor will be more pronounced.

The lovely thing about this drink, besides the fact that it’s refreshing, is that you can get really inventive with it and use really any type of fruit you have on hand. Either time we’ve made it we had strawberries, lemons and limes, but really, you could do most any fruit and it would turn out just as well.

Also, if you have an upcoming picnic, consider serving this in bell jars – it can be a nod to the eventual strawberry jam to come.

So if it’s hot, humid and you have no air conditioning make yourself some strawberry lemonade stat!

When I was growing up it was tradition that my mom would always make me some variation of strawberry shortcake for my birthday. I am not entirely sure why. Maybe it was because of my love of the Strawberry Shortcake. Or maybe it was because strawberries were showing up on grocery store shelves in April. No matter the reason, I loved it. The cake. The strawberries. The whipped cream. Mmmmm…

A few days ago when my…ahem…30th birthday was approaching (ahem!) I decided to honor tradition by making vegan strawberry shortcake for myself and my husband.

Vegan Strawberry Shortcake

• 1 pint fresh strawberries, sliced (you can use frozen, but it is so much better when you have fresh strawberries)
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 2 cups flour (I used only white all-purpose flour)
• 2 Tbsp. sugar
• 3 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1/3 cup shortening (or you can probably use Earth Balance or Soy Garden)
• 3/4 cup milk (I used unsweetened Silk soy milk)
• Vegan plain or vanilla yogurt, or vegan vanilla ice cream, or Soyatoo

Mix the strawberries and the 1/4 cup sugar together and let it sit while you make the cake.

Heat the oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit. In a large bowl mix all of your dry ingredients well, then cut in the shortening or vegan butter with a pastry blender or two knives. When the mixture has fine crumbs, stir in the milk until it is just blended.

On a lightly floured surface knead the dough a few times, then you can prepare your cake(s) in one of a couple of ways:

1. You can roll out the dough until it is 1/2 inch thick, and use a large biscuit cutter to cut the dough. Place these on a cookie sheet and then bake for about 10-12 minutes.

OR

2. You can do what I did. We have little Pyrex baking dishes which are perfect for making little cakes. I split the dough in half into equal pieces and then I pressed them into two small Pyrex dishes. I then placed the dishes on a cookie sheet (makes it easier to take out of the oven), and then baked them in the oven for about 15 minutes. I also checked in on them occasionally to make sure I wasn’t over baking.

When you take these out of the oven, take them off of their cookie sheet or out of their Pyrex containers and put on a cooling rack. Let them completely cool if possible, or at least wait until they are cool enough to comfortably handle.

Cut one of the cakes in half horizontally, then place the bottom half on a plate. Scoop some vegan yogurt, ice cream, or squirt Soyatoo on top of the cake. Spoon some of your strawberries on top of this. Place the top half of the cake on top of your strawberries and cream, and repeat with more yogurt, ice cream, or Soyatoo and strawberries.

I have to say that I love this. The cake is sweet, but not too sweet. The fresh strawberries add more sweet and the flavor of spring. And the yogurt/ice cream/Soyatoo rounds it out with creaminess.

Happy birthday to me. I may have to celebrate off and on for the next few weeks. I need to revisit this. :)