Le Confiture of Nectarines and Blueberries

Did you know that jam was originally created to preserve fruit because there was no refrigeration?  Yeah.  It was brought back to Europe by the Crusaders who set out to conquer the Holy Land. So you see, had the Holy Roman Empire never set out to slaughter Muslims, pagans, and Jews, we would never have jam. It was also a staple upon ships that brought the settlers over to America once it was discovered that vitamin C in fruit prevented scurvy, as fresh fruit would have rotted on the long voyage. Again, rape and pillage leads to the diaspora of les confitures. Thanks to jam, Columbus was able to live long enough to massacre and enslave the Indians of Hispaniola. Hooray for jam! You do have to look for the bright notes in even the most wicked parts of history after all. 


Oh come on now.  Don’t start thinking that you’ll 86 jam from your diet in effort to rebel against the making of an America built on carnage.  Most everything you put into your mouth was discovered by way of bloodshed and conquer. If you cut out jam, you'll also have to do away with coffee, tomatoes, oranges, curry, couscous, sugar cane and circumcision.

Now that I’ve enraged, reminded and depressed you, let’s make jam!

OK. I’ve decided to make the most of my favorite summer fruit combination: blueberries and nectarines.  You could make peach, apricot, white nectarine (mmm!), or whatever you want.

Here’s what you’ll need:

Enough fruit that when cut up amounts to five cups. Obviously if you’re going with blueberry nectarine you don’t have to cut up the blueberries. One to one and a quarter cups of sugar (if you like it less sweet, then just a cup is cool, or less, it's your jam), and the juice of one whole lemon, preferably one that you've stolen from your neighbors tree.

Great. You’ve sliced up and measured your fruit. Put it in a pretty bowl and squeeze the juice of a whole lemon over it. Now dump in your cup (or cup and a quarter, which I chose to do) sugar. I’m using organic, unprocessed, evaporated, blah, blah, blah. Mix this all up, yeah.

Cover with Saran, and pop it in the fridge overnight to macerate. Macerating means to soften by means of soaking. What we are doing here is getting the fruit to soften up and release its juice.

Now that it’s all macerated, get it into a pot and bring to a boil.

Then turn your fuego down and simmer for around five minutes or so, just till the fruit softens. The blueberries will start to split open.

Now drain the juice in a fine mesh sieve. Reserve the fruit. Put the juice back into the pot and bring to a boil.

Turn it down and simmer:

Till it gets thick and syrupy in consistency. How will you know? Well, see how the juice does not cover the spatch? It's not syrupy enough here.

When it’s syrupy, it’ll cover the back of the spoon like this.

You’ll also know that it’s syrupy because the light-colored foam will subside and the juice/syrup will look glossy and roll slowly in the pot.

Great. Now get your fruit back into the pot. Stir it about.

Et voila! Le confiture de nectarines et myrtilles!

Be sure to cool first before eating, well, at least to warm. I spooned mine into these fun little jam jars. And I just have to say, the sweet/acid balance in mine was perfect.

They will keep in the fridge for...I don't know how long. A while I guess. I'll have to get back to you on that. I do intend to eat it pretty quickly, so, my report about the shelf-life might not be based on empirical evidence. Just don’t put it in the cupboard. We didn’t actually ‘can’ the fruit, which involves a whole sterilization process, so if you don’t refrigerate it, it will grow botulism and kill you.

Mangia bene, vivi felice!