Strawberry Rhubarb Jam
4-3/4 cups prepared fruit (about 1-1/2 qt. fully ripe strawberries and 1-1/4 lb. fully ripe rhubarb)
1 cup water
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1 box Pectin
1/2 tsp. butter or margarine
8-1/2 cups sugar
`Prepar sanitized jars, lids and screw caps.
`Bring to boil the water and chopped rhubarb.
`Reduce heat simmer for 2ish minutes, till rhubarb is soft.
`Add three cups prepared rhubarb to 1 and 3/4 cup mashed strawberries in `large pot.
`Add lemon juice.
`Add pectin
`Add butter if you want to reduce foam
`Bring to boil.
`Add sugar.
`Return to full rolling boil.
`Boil 2 to 4 minutes. The longer you let it boil, the firmer the jam when set but don't boil it past 5 min or you might end up with jello jiggler type jelly. Stiff enough to eat with your fingers in shapes.
`Scoop off the foam if you want.
`Ladle into prepared jars to 1/4-1/2 in from top, wipe the rims if you get any on them. Screw on lids till hand tight. Process 10 minutes in water canner or do as I do when I'm lazy, invert the jar onto it's lid for five minutes then turn up right. My way does not make the jam capable of lasting to long so only do it if you intend to give end results away immediately or expect to eat it all with in three to four months.
Quince Jelly
(if your lucky enough to afford quince or get it free, jelly is the best way to go when you don't know what to do with this hard tart/sour/bitter fruit. People will swear your created magic honey jelly
)
3 1/2 lbs of quince
7 cups water
Enough sugar to add almost a cup of sugar (about 7/8 cup if you can manage to measure the exact amount) for every cup of juice (about 4 cups in the end)
Cheese cloth
Candy thermomenter
`Prepare your jars, lids, screw tops or parafin wax should you like to seal it old fashion style.
`Gently wash your pear/apple looking quince. Yes fuzz is okay if you can't get it off because you'll strain it in cheese cloth later.
`Quarter, remove stems, and core the fruit. Seeds produce pectin film when wet so it's okay if some end up in the pot because again you'll strain it all in the cheese cloth.
`Cover chopped fruit with water to about an inch above the fruit.
`Bring to boil then reduce heat to simmer
`Simmer, stirring occasionally for 45 min to 1 hour. It takes a long time to soften this fruit. Mash it up good with a potato masher. If you've got a goop looking like runny apple sauce you're as golden as the goop is. If it's like thick gloppy apple sauce just add water a half cup at a time till it's runny apple sauce looking goop.
`Strain in cheese cloth untouched for 3-6 hours. One can either tie up the cheese cloth over a cupboard to let gravity help drip it into the clean bowl or just line a caulendar with two-three layers of cheese cloth and let it drip that way if you've a caulendar that can fit in a bowl/pot and not come close to touching bottom. Otherwise the juice just sets in the bottom of the fruit and you want to seperate it.
`When done dripping measure out your juice to find out how much you have.
`Reffer back above and measure your sugar accordingly to the amount of juice you got.
`Turn heat on under the juice pot, slowly add sugar till completly dissolved then bring to full boil.
`You'll have a yellow to pink color in your juice, it all depends on the varity of quince you have. So don't worry.
`Stiring constantly on full boil, get the mixture to 220-224 degrees F. Basically 8 degrees above the temp it starts boiling at.
`Time to start testing the jelly. There's many ways to do this. Back of a metal spoon. On a cold plate. If the jelly is thick enough when slightly cooled to wrinkle when you push it with your nail then your done boiling.
~Your jelly will range from rose pink to rich deep red-orange. Again all depending on the variety of quince you acquired. It seems to me the longer slower you bring it to boil/set jelly stages, the deeper the color seems to get.
`Ladle into prepared jars. Wipe off rim if you get jelly on it.
~If sealing with wax, fill jars to 3/5 in from top so you can put about 1/4 inch of wax on top once it rises out of the jelly. Put on lid and screw down only hand tight. Let set untouched for 24 hours
~If sealing with self sealing lids/screwtops, fill to 1/4 in of the top of jar. Screw down lids hand tight and invert for five minutes then turn back over upside right and don't touch for 24.
`Both methods you'll hear the lids pop down as they seal. Wax sealing takes a little longer because you can't invert the jars onto the lids.
`Should you decide you can't make jelly without processing it as well, you can. Just place jars in water canner with one inch water over top jars and process for five minutes-ish. The hour long boiling to get the juice out and again to thicken the jelly usually kills anything bad in the juice unlike normal jelly where you don't boil the fruit anywhere as long to prepair it to strain.
Warm quince jelly is about near the only food I've come acrossed that'll make me melt like only my husband can.
*chuckles* This will make the best holiday gifts you can imagine. Few people in the US know what a quince is let alone had the oppritunity to try them.
Jelly, Jams, and Preserves 
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