Tart-Sweet and Mysterious
Plum Cardamom Jam
Hi friends, I needed a little palate-cleansing in between all the Classic German Cooking content so I made some jam over the weekend, which always makes me feel centered. Never fear, German recipes will be back on the docket today when NPR’s All Things Considered (!!!) comes over in a few hours to chat while I make Maultaschen (Swabian Meat-and-Spinach Dumplings) and Quarkbällchen (Sugared Quark Fritters) for them. Details on that and when it will air as soon as I know more. In the meantime, here’s my little Monday morning jam-making treatise.
I realized this weekend that my stash of homemade jam in the pantry was cleaned out. I always try to have some homemade jam or fruit butter for last-minute gifts. We haven’t gone apple picking yet, so it’s too early for apple butter and obviously my beloved Seville oranges are still several months away. But the last fall plums can still be found; they’re huge and sweet at this point in the season. I bought a few pounds on Friday and decided to make the cardamom plum jam from Liana Krissoff’s preserving cookbook, one of my favorite cookbooks of all time. (I acquired it for the publishing company I used to work for; more on that origin story here.)
The jam has ground cardamom and lime juice, which makes it tart-sweet and gives it a slightly mysterious flair, and comes together pretty quickly. Start to finish, it took me a little under an hour. You could cook it a little longer if you wanted a stiffer set, but I like this consistency and it’s good for stirring into yogurt or putting in crostata1, too. It’s a relatively low-sugar jam, which means that once it’s opened, it won’t keep that long. Refrigerate it and use it up within a week or two. Once refrigerated, the jam firms up a little more too.
Liana’s original recipe calls for regular plums; I used Zwetschgen or Italian prune plums. It doesn’t really matter which you use. Her original recipe is a little fussier - she dices the fruit and has you reduce the plum syrup separately before adding the fruit back into the syrup. I just quarter the plums and I cook them in their syrup the whole time. It makes for a more rustic result, but that’s okay by me.
Once the jam is canned and the jars are sealed and cleaned, I love filling out the labels, which I buy online or at Italian grocery stores, and stocking the pantry again. It gives me such a cozy, fuzzy feeling to see the jars all lined up on the bottom shelf of the pantry and of all the nice plans we have in the months to come where a jar of this jam will be a welcome gift.
A note on food safety:
As always when I make jam, I fill the boiling hot jam into sterilized jars to the very top, wipe the edges, cap them tightly and turn the jars upside down until completely cooled. This helps vacuum seal the jars, which you can test by pressing the lids in the middle once cooled. If the lid doesn’t budge (or make a sound), they’re good to go. Any jar that doesn’t vacuum seal goes in the fridge and is for us to eat. But as long as the jar is vacuum-sealed, it’ll keep in the pantry for up to a year. (For water-bath canning, Liana’s original recipe in the book has all the details.) This is the European way to can jam and it is safe. (American food safety experts are overzealous and, in my opinion, erroneously conflate the dangers of canning vegetables with the benign practice of canning fruit long-cooked with sugar, both of which kill bacteria. If you aren’t comfortable with this, that’s fine - you can follow Liana’s instructions for water-bath canning in her book.
Liana Krissoff’s Plum Cardamom Jam
Adapted from Canning for a New Generation
Makes about 5 jars
4 pounds ripe black plums, pitted and sliced
2 cups sugar
3 tablespoons strained fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon freshly ground cardamom seeds (or a little more if cardamom is pre-ground)
Sterilize several glass jam jars and lids. Set aside.
Put the plums and sugar in a 6- to 8-quart pot. Bring to a simmer, stirring frequently, then continue to cook for 15 minutes.
Add the lime juice and cardamom and stir well. Simmer, stirring frequently, about 15 to 20 minutes, until a small dab of the jam spooned onto the cold plate and set in the freezer for a minute becomes somewhat firm (it will not gel). Remove from heat.
Ladle the hot jam into the jars, leaving 1/8-inch headspace at the top. Use a damp paper towel to wipe the rims of the jars, then screw on the lids tightly and turn upside down. Do not disturb for 12 hours.
Turn the jars right-side-up and check that the lids have sealed by pressing down on the center of each; if it can be pushed down, it hasn't sealed, and the jar should be refrigerated immediately. Label the sealed jars and store.
Classic German Cooking book tour:
On October 29th, I’ll be at Powerhouse Arena chatting with Deb Perelman. Tickets here.
On October 30th, I’ll be at the Pfister Hotel in Milwaukee for a dinner from the book. Tickets here.
On November 1st, I’ll at Dank Haus in Chicago for a cooking demo and conversation with Tim Mazurek. Tickets here.
On November 3rd, I’ll be at Bold Fork Books in Washington D.C. with Olga Massov. Tickets here.
On November 4th, I’ll be at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, NY, for a reading and signing. Open to the public.
Remember: If you pre-order Classic German Cooking, you get a booklet of five delicious bonus recipes. Click here for U.S. based readers. For everyone else, email me at luisa.weiss@gmail.com with a copy of your preorder receipt to receive the booklet.
I’ll send out the recipe for this soon.
Hello,
I have been canning jams and jellies for more than 40 years and do not use a water bath and have never had any issues with my jams. This is the method I learned from my mother and grandmother...I think the water bath step could be a safeguard or preference for someone who is not experienced with canning or who may want to take that extra precautionary step. Also depending on how long they are planning to store their jams and preserves could be another deciding factor. I date label and use before 2 years, (the are usually consumed long before that) storing in a cool dry environment.
NPR!!!!!!