Bee Spit Jam
It is full on summer harvest time. I know that some folks may wonder what century it is when Alycia and I start talking about making pickles or putting up peaches and making jam, but if you have any desire to get out of the city and think about how food gets on our tables, this is the perfect time of year. As I write this I’m stirring spaghetti sauce made with tomatoes from Butler’s Orchard in Germantown, MD.
It’s still prime season for blackberries, raspberries, and peaches and the apples are coming soon (mmmm…caramel apples). I have forty-seven jars of blackberry preserves and fourteen jars of raspberry jam so far. There was one drawback which may have been because we were raspberry picking in the middle of the day - there were about a million bees trying to get to the same ripe, juicy raspberries we were. There was one bee that was so determined that he stuck his face right into the berry I’d just picked. That’s when Ian came up with the name “Bee Spit Jam.”
Try to look surprised at Christmas when you get jam. And I boil it for a long time. There’s no bee spit left. I promise.