Spiced Plum Sauce

Yesterday we came home from the market with all kinds of goodies and ended up with several different kinds of plums (red and purple, green gages, Damson).  Of course when buying organic fruit it doesn't last long, so I had to jump into more jam making early this morning. 

It is funny how I never intend to do anything in particular, the fruit is on hand and then thoughts form in my head - this is the right combination or this fruit will taste great with these spices. Today it was exactly like that - I had all of these juicy overripe plums, and could smell something spicy going with them.

It did start out as a jam, and I did add apple to the mixture still trying to make every effort to get these concoctions to thicken, however I ended up with a spiced plum sauce, which tastes delicious. My efforts do seem to pay off, when I just go with it! LOL

I chopped up about 5 cups of plums and added 2 small apples, plus the juice of 1 lemon (because it always seems like the right thing to do?) and 1/2 cup of apple concentrate. The plums immediately dissolved into mostly water and I had to let the mixture bubble away for a lot longer then usual.

Plums and apple mixture

Half way through the cooking I added 1/2 teaspoon full of cinnamon and then a sachet bag of whole cloves. For the life of me I could not see myself fishing them out at the end - so I placed a large tablespoon of cloves inside a piece of muslin cloth tied it up and threw it into the plum jam. 

Sachet of Cloves

It smelled great! Very spicy stuff in the end - and will be nice to complement other dishes. I had some on toast and my mouth is still slightly tinged with the taste of it. I could see this being used as a sauce over egg fried jasmine rice and fish...Yumm! 

Then I was back to our feast weekend - where everyone gets to choose their favourite meals and French toast appeared to have won for the lunch time treat. I don't normally do anything fancy when I make this, just duck eggs, cinnamon, nutmeg, goat's milk for the mixture, soak spelt bread (it was cinnamon date bread) and cook this over a hot pan.

Soaking the bread....

Today I served the hot French toast with my homemade apple sauce, goat's butter and maple syrup. Needless to say, there wasn't anything left over! It was yummy and the kids got their treat. This is such an easy meal to make (once in a while) which everyone loves. 

Nearly done....! 

Last night I also made a big batch of Coconut Date balls to have on hand as snacks for the weekend, because I am not buying anything ready made from a shop of any kind (no more date bars etc) - not when we can make our own. These are little energy bars and taste great with chopped figs, dates, tahini, jam, ground nuts all rolled in coconut - lets see how long they last!

Coconut Date Balls with dandelion coffee...

Well, off to sort out the herb garden, enjoy your long weekend,

April

Thick, thick, thick..

The words thick, thick, thick have been going around in my head over the past 24 hours or so as I try to figure out how to get my jams to be a little thicker. I am trying all the usual means - well, you know, that means that I am attempting to make pectin myself!

Strain the cooked apples into a bowl

Last night I followed all the directions carefully on a website that was explaining how to make your own pectin for jams and jellies. Of course, I probably did not have the exact right kind of apple, however, all apples are supposed to contain some pectin - I did manage to produce a thickish syrup from the apples, which seemed to slightly thicken the jam I was making. However, I would have liked it a little bit more jammy.

Today, it is back to the drawing board - I asked around at the market in Skibbereen this morning as well, looking for unripe tart apples. No luck so far. So, I will try my hand at this again tonight with another batch of jams that I want to make this time using a different kind of apple.

Yesterday I used up the last of my raspberries to make raspberry kiwi jam - for something that has no sweetener whatsoever, it does taste really good. I am just not that happy with the consistency of it, but the rest of the family loved it (they ate it without complaint!).

So, that was yesterday, more jam (the cupboards are filling up) and today we are home again from the market with more fruit ready to be made into jams and preserves. However, this time I am going to do some experimenting with carrageenan, agar flakes and the homemade pectin to see what I can come up with.

I keep telling myself that as long as it is homemade (no recipe found yet for agar flakes) and wholesome, our bodies will appreciate the effort being made to remove any kind of processed foods from our diets.

And eventually, I will be more adept at all of this with my own recipes down to a T!

Well, today there is sun, so I am harvesting and drying some herbs from my garden, the entire house smells divine - pictures tomorrow.

April

Raspberries, Kiwi and Apple ready to cook into jam 

Love Food

Yesterday was fairly productive for me in terms of coming off of a 10 day Master Cleanse and getting back to cooking and eating. The difference between the fasting state and the food state is profound in terms of creativity, focus and clarity. It is a transition that I have not really enjoyed mainly because I am afraid (there's that word again) of not being as focused or feeling as good as I do when fasting. 

However, they are just two different states of being and here I am on to the next phase of what I would call day on/day off food and fasting. Although yesterday was mainly a juice day, I did do some baking and made a small batch of jam with the fruit that I had on hand. 

So, the jam story thus far has taken me around the world to find ideas about combinations for the fruit that I had available - something that would taste good and be an interesting flavour at the same time. I am determined to use organic and local as much as possible even if it only forms the base of the final product. 

I had a small amount of local strawberries but not enough to make a batch of jam on it's own, so I needed to put something with it. I found mention of strawberry kiwi jam - but it called for sugar and lots of pectin. I reasoned if I used some kiwi, a couple of tart apples, apple concentrate and perhaps a thickener like agar flakes, then I could make some kind of jam from this and it should taste ok. 

Late last night I chopped up all that I had on hand - strawberries, kiwi and 2 tart apples, these went into the pot with the other ingredients and 1/2 an hour later out came the jam. It was not as thick as I would have liked, but it did thicken, once blended it looked and smelled really nice too. It was not overly sweet but not tart or tangy, just pleasant tasting.

It nearly filled 3 full jars - which by the way I am getting to be very proficient at, as they all sealed right up within a minute or so after coming from the boiling water bath. It is so interesting how canning my own foods was something that I had talked about doing for years, kept putting it off because I thought it would be so complicated and tedious. And it is none of these. 

The other adventures yesterday were the normal ones for me of baking breads. When not fasting, I bake 2 small loaves of organic whole grain spelt bread each day - this will usually be sweet bread with sultanas, cinnamon and seeds, herbed bread with rosemary and thyme, honey oat bread with our own honey, or naan bread with sesame seeds. Or some combination thereof. 

Yesterday I made honey oat muffins (which were gone so fast I couldn't even get a photo of them all!) and sweet bread. I have been making my own bread for awhile and made bread each week as a young girl growing up. It is something of a comfort food for us here and so easy to make. 

I am baffled by those who buy anything that comes from a shop in terms of bread - this is the one food which should be your link as a family. Bake the bread together, eat and enjoy it - this food conveys your love and care for each other always reminding us of home. 

Honey oat and sweet spelt breads

Feeding ourselves well is what this is all about, this is not work, this is love.

April

Love Summer Fruits

Yesterday was another interesting day with still being on this fast, and wanting to create and cook - I ended up making ice cream and apple sauce in small batches to just keep myself occupied really. I find that I relax, am happy in myself and can think or process through things when I am busy working with food. 

First of all ice cream is something that I have been making for awhile and we have a small ice cream maker. The main reason we got this was because we had been all going without any ice cream for several years due to the fact that we don't eat cows milk, sugar or want the added chemicals of commercial ice cream.

There are companies out there who make ice cream from goat's milk however, it would have other ingredients that we did not like or need. Therefore, being resourceful, I started to make my own for our special occasions (such as summer!) and feast days. There is a feast day coming up soon at the beginning of August, and now the ice cream is ready for this celebration. 

When I first started out making ice cream I just researched what other people were doing and then improvised to fit our own needs - and it turns out very well. I make goat's milk ice cream using bananas, milk, jam and little else.

Yesterday I used 4 bananas, about 2.5 cups of goat's milk, 1//2 cup fresh peach jam and a tiny bit of raw agave syrup - mostly because I could not taste it to see how sweet it was. Otherwise I would not use the agave, but the jams I am making are mainly only fruit, some lemon juice and 1/2 cup of apple concentrate per batch of jam. They will not be overly sweet.

Then I decided to try my hand at making my applesauce recipe and canning it into the last remaining jars because I had apples that were not being eaten. I never liked applesauce as a child or at any other time - until I started making it myself. I think for me it has to do with the texture - if it's too much like baby food, I don't want it.

I also like applesauce that is warm and spicy with lots of cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger or allspices in it. So this is what I did - 8 cups of chopped apples, teaspoons of spices, tiny bit of lemon juice and cooked the apples into a sauce. They bottled up perfectly as well, in the jars that would not seal the day before, go figure! 

Now, when I open the cupboard there are a dozen jars lined up filled with jams and sauces - ready for the coming winter and changing seasons. It is a warm and fuzzy feeling for me and I truly feel right now these few remaining items that have been creeping into our diets will be eliminated once and for all.

Soon, I want to try my hand at making some chutneys and perhaps pickles as I get more adventurous  with my canning abilities. Last night Max came home with over 30 more jars, so I guess that was my green light to keep going with this. 

Keeping it real here in West Cork,

April

This is my ice cream maker - very simple little thing!

Here is a deep mixing bowl filled with the 4 ingredients of my ice cream

Love In The Making...

If I were to be completely honest about the true way that I want to live - the way that I have always dreamed of living, it would be to create, source, grow, make, cook and provide all of my own food. And of course, through doing this as a family we would be even healthier, stronger in body and spirit without much energy coming in from outside sources. 

Most people would look at us and think that already we are pretty well free from food and lifestyle of the majority - and we are. I do not eat the same foods as others, I always cook our own meals, which are mainly vegetarian unless it is a feast day or festival. However, we got to a point that we were feeling stuck in our souls - unable to move forward any further towards our goals, and I feel that this remaining 'food' that was coming into our diets from outside sources, was the sticking point. 

Even though I have been doing this for a little while now, there are still areas for improvement and you would probably not be surprised how easily processed foods creep back in to our food chain when we get busy. There is a lot I want to say about eating this food - the first thing is that it is devoid of love. Machines, people just doing a job, government regulations, corporate rules, bottom lines and business plans - do not place a lot of 'love energy' into the final product. 

Why is this a real problem for those of us wanting to walk the talk and follow a spiritual path you might be asking? It is because, when food is empty of love, it fills up with something else - and this is fear. When an energy is removed (during processing) something else comes in to fill the void, like a vacuum.  So, we have been consuming fear, it doesn't feel good and I am doing something about it. 

I started with jams because this is something that we would eat a lot of - sugar free jam is also relatively easy to make as well. Over the years I would have considered we were buying some of the best quality jams and I have enjoyed them. They are tasty and full of fruit - however, they are still made in a factory which is processed food and contains the negative qualities that I no longer want in my body.

Last night, I decided to start out on the right foot, I researched how to use my glass jars for the jams and followed all the instructions to the letter - at the end of the evening I was sitting down, listening as each jar lid popped and sealed. Exactly as it was supposed to do.

So, I was pleased with the good start. We now have 8 jars of peach and nectarine ginger jam! And I am delighted with it. Of course, it is fruit season right now, so I want to carry on with making quite a few more jams for the winter - you might be hearing a lot about jam making in the coming days. (smile)

I also realized how much more equipment I need to get, as well as to source more jars. I can see that I am going to be busy with this - and of course, there is nothing I would love more.

Have a great day,

April

Some remaining jars waiting for labels - the half filled one, will be enjoyed as soon as we are finished our Master Cleanse!