Jam, Jelly & Butter

I've taken a few canning classes at our local County Extension Office recently. The office is fairly close to our city Farmers Market which is a medium size market but has very few local farmers selling. Basically, most of the produce is from other countries & has about as much flavor as a cardbord box. However, there was an article in our local paper a few weeks ago about a lady who sells things that her family grows themselves. She's been selling at the market for over 50 years!

Anyway, I decided to stop by after my last canning class (peach jam). While looking for her stand I noticed a sign advertising produce from a town very near our Country House. They were selling peaches, peas & watermelons. The peaches were very ripe & the lady selling said they had to be used right away. I bought a box & brought them home. She was certainly right about the ripeness. They were very soft & I didn't think they would hold up to dehydrating very well. Since I didn't have any pectin I decided to make peach butter. Basically, you peal & chop them & cook with sugar very slowly until it's very thick. Then, process in a water bath. My box of peaches made 5 paltry pints but it's very tasty. I'll definitely make this again. Although, I think I'll cook in a crockpot the next time.

I read Sandy's blog post about watermelon jelly a couple of weeks ago & decided to give it a try. I must have done something wrong because it just won't 'set'. I even reprocessed one batch, adding more pectin, & it still won't jell. Oh well, I now have 12 1/2 pints of lovely watermelon juice. I need to find the blog post that I recently read, on watermelon spritzer's. Anyone know who's blog that was on?

Undaunted, I then decided to try Sci Fi Chick's pepper jelly recipe. We have a habanero plant that is about three years old. We don't eat many of them but my husband picks them & gives them away to his customers. When ripe they are a lovely orange color. I put on rubber gloves & picked a handful, cut off tops & scooped out the seeds. I also added some bell pepper from the garden. I processed & it came out great. Absolutely delicious!

Oh well, I'm off to the Ritz for a conference this afternoon, back on Tuesday. Yeah it's work but at least it's at a nice resort. Too bad it's going to rain the entire time, dang tropical disturbance.