The day the lonesome can. This is the closest you'll ever see me flag-waving, so enjoy! Mr. Reluctant and I chose Independence Day 1998 to become officially husband and wife. We liked the irony. Now, nine years later, we're spending the day apart for the first time ever, I think. Even when we lived in different states (for three years), we were always together in the beginning of July. So I slave over a hot stove, on a hot day, turning berries into magic. There are worse things, I suppose.
Next year my raspberries will be, with all good luck, fecund. This year, I had to go to the farm stand to buy them. Oregon's Willamette Valley, where I am very pleased to say I live, is a huge berry-producing area. We are most proud of the Marionberry, which is a huge blackberry and not to be confused with Marion Barry, but I love the Boysenberry the most. Boysenberries are a cross between a blackberry, a red raspberry, and a Loganberry (itself a cross between the first two). They are reddish-purple and plump, and have a particular haunting, tart edge to the blackberry flavor. Needless to say, they make delicious jam. If you are ever in Oregon, be sure to find a place to taste our varieties of blackberry jam: Marionberry, Evergreen blackberry, wild (Himalayan) blackberry, Ollalieberry, and Boysenberry.
Although I've made blackberry jam and have eaten Boysenberries off the vine in Michigan (we had them at our house growing up), I've never been lucky enough to find a flat at a farm stand. Until now! YUM! I added a bit of my homemade blueberry liqueur, and used less sugar than usual (and Pomona pectin), and put up a big stock of Blue Boysenberry Jam and Hungarian Kisses Raspberry Jam (with Hungarian apricot liqueur).
And I did it all without an operational hood fan and no ventilation in the stove area on a 90-degree day. Now if that isn't hard core, I don't know what is. Let the freedom to do dumb things in the heat ring.
No comments:
Post a Comment