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Friday, August 28, 2009

My Midlife Crisis aka Jam Making

Sally HP was shocked to learn that not only had I never made jam, but I also had never seen jam been made nor knew anyone who had ever made jam growing up. "What about canning?" she asked.

My experience with canning has been eating the occasional can of Jolly Green Giant vegetables growing up. She was so surprised by what I said I had a second of doubt where I wondered if maybe I had misspoken about other people. I called a few childhood friends and they confirmed that they had never seen jam being made nor knew anything about canning. I'm from the North Shore suburbs of Chicago and while it certainly isn't a city, it is a lot more city like than where I currently live. For starters, the houses are much more spread apart here than where I grew up. Yes, my parents had a little vegetable garden, but it was small.

Anyhow, Sally HP ran a jam making class for our moms group last week. Of course what choice did I have but to go, right? Actually after listening to her talk about it, I was quite intrigued. I even made the Big Giraffe come strawberry picking with me. He lived in NYC until he was 30 and had never picked berries. Then again, I had never picked berries before I joined my moms group for all the above reasons and one other big one: I don't even know of a place you could go berry picking that was close to where I grew up.

The Big Giraffe absolutely hated it. Actually come to think of it, I didn't like strawberry picking either. It's hot, dirty and it kills your back. I don't think it helped that our younger son (YS) spotted an outhouse in the middle of the strawberry and suddenly needed to use it. That might have been the last straw for the Big Giraffe who ended up taking him. Plus you know who ended up doing all the berry picking, right? The Big Giraffe and I while two little boys stuffed their faces with strawberries until they were full and then whined to leave. I tried to convince BG that blueberry and raspberry picking are much more fun (it's true!) but he has retired his berry picking container so to speak. He said that future berry picking would involve him carefully selecting containers of berries from the grocery store.

Either way, I had my berries for jam making. Sally HP sent out a list of supplies needed and of course it appeared to be written in another language and of course I promptly forgot everything I needed. After attending my heated yoga class on the hottest day of the summer, I called her from store slightly dehydrated and totally confused about what I needed. I had managed to find the jam making section. I didn't even know such a section existed. They must have put it together while I was at yoga because surely I would have noticed it in all my years of shopping.

I got 8 oz glass preserving jars and pectin. I'll admit I had no idea what pectin was either. It's gelling agent, think gelatin. Apparently I was also supposed to bring a rack, for what?, and a large pot. Also, for you clueless jam makers out there, and believe me there's no judgement here, the recipe is on the back of the box of pectin.

I came back pleased with myself. BG looked really concerned and asked if I was alright. I was surprised I mean I knew I was all sweaty from yoga class, but I go every Monday so it's hardly a surprise. He tried again. Was I feeling OK with my choice to be a SAHM? Did I think it was time to go back to school. I had no idea what he was getting at. I mean yes, recently I have been thinking a lot about going back to school, but that's nothing new. Finally he looked at me and said two words: jam making. Oh.....he thought I was having a midlife crisis. So did a bunch of my other friends. I've had two conversations this week alone with friends over it!

Blame it on Sally HP. Anyhow, jam making was really easy. You mash up the berries, boil them with water, sugar, a little bit of butter and of course the pectin. Then you pore it into a jar and put the top on it. Then you put the jars in boiling water on top of the infamous rack to seal the lid although one veteran jam maker who was at the class had never done the last step since the heat from the jam alone seals the jar. I of course will do that last step because all I need from my already skeptical family is to give them diarerrea from my jam. I'm kidding! All that would happen is that you would get mold which you could just scrape off.

I was pleased with my jam. This holiday season I'll be able to give the gift of jam and as well as the gift of concern as the recipients wonder if I'm having a midlife crisis. Perhaps I should also enclose a phone card from them to use to call the BG about their concern.

A. Elliot's Lesson Learned: If you're in a jam for holiday gifts, try making jam; it's really easy.

Labels: Humor (at least Attempted)

posted by Alex Elliot @ 6:15 AM 3 comments

3 Comments:

At 8/28/2009 1:33 PM, Goofball said…

Jan has made cherry jam this summer when some friends gave us a lot of them.

My cousin brought some as a gift as well.

So it's not linked to midlife crisis though. but I'm not the least bit tempted to try myself! (maybe because I don't like eating jam very much either)
At 8/28/2009 4:58 PM, Sally HP said…

Fun and easy, fun and easy! Just three more days until I'm in posession of my own pint sized canning rack...then I, too, can be jamtastic!
At 9/02/2009 11:30 AM, Heather said…

I just made my very first batch of jam this week. I would never have tried it if my freezer hadn't died, leaving me with ten pounds of blueberries that had to be put in something quick.

Of course the irony is I spent about $50 in canning supplies to salvage $18 worth of berries. Oh well, the jam is pretty tasty.

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Name:	Alex Elliot
Home:	MA, United States
About Me:	Professional Mom of two cats, a dog, an ant farm, and oh yeah...two boys: a 5 year old and a 3 year old. Also found in my house is my husband who is known on this blog as The Big Giraffe.
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