Every year I see seasonal posts from canners, bakers, cooks, and gardeners – each sharing ways to use up the annual batch of preserved fruit before the next harvest arrives.
Here’s a place to consolidate those ideas: what are your good ideas and intentions for purposing the abundant fruits of your labor?
Jam makes a nice glaze for pork tenderloin. It can also enhance a popsicle. Some of my favorite ways to use up jam involve baked goods:
I am very lacking in imagination in this department - thumbprint cookies are about my limit. However, I just made a jar of kumquat marmalade which is not very sweet and would be perfect for pork, poultry, other savory applications.
I love making a French style strawberry jam - berries can be so abundant, and the “no cook” method makes such a beautiful product. The problem is we don’t like eating strawberry jam all that much - too sweet for our taste. I rarely make it any more for that reason, but I recall years where I made so much we couldn’t even give it all away.
I’m not a baker, but I do like some jams/chutneys used in savory preparations - baked brie is a favorite of ours. I like to use certain jams/chutneys inside of grilled cheese sandwiches. Some can be used as a base for salad dressings, and mixed with wine or vinegar and oil to make a marinade for fish, poultry, meat and vegetables. Just some ideas off the top of my head…
I’ve been keeping my jamming under control by limiting my jam making to a jar or three. I use the microwave to cook a batch and a few jars of any fruit limits the output. Otherwise, I found I was stockpiling them! We, and family, are modest users of jam.
Split-second cookies are the simpler cousin of thumbprints. (That recipe was originally on Chowhound’s editorial side, which was where I discovered it.) And @mig, who makes a lot of jam, introduced me to “jamaretti”, a version that uses almond paste in the dough.
In the non-traditional use category, I remember a grape jelly-based glaze for meatballs that used to be popular.
So I could see any jam / preserve plus a spice element (gochujang, sriracha, hot sauce of your choice) and tart element (vinegar, tamarind, orange juice) mixing into a good sweet-sour-spicy glaze or bbq sauce for meatballs or chicken thighs or ribs or any other meat.
I’ve also mixed jam and sriracha / hot sauce together as a topping for baked Brie (inspired by hot pepper jelly).
And if you like something sweet with cheese, spread some inside a grilled cheese.
On the more traditional front, there’s also rugelach and hamantaschen.
And you can thin it a bit to use as a cocktail syrup / flavored simple syrup (I used strawberry syrup recently in an old fashioned and it was lovely, but orange would be even better).
Jam and mint or ginger muddled into a cocktail! I don’t have a specific recipe, but blackberry, raspberry, or strawberry jam added into a collins-like drink can be a delicious way to use a tablespoon of fruity goodness at the home bar
