Friday, May 06, 2011

Mommy Jam

Last weekend I made jam.  Homemade strawberry rhubarb jam.  Just call me Martha... or Jan.  Because Jan is pretty much a Martha.  It all started when I saw this recipe for Strawberry Rhubarb Jam on Mennonite Girls Can Cook.  Rhubarb grows in my yard like a weed.  Some may even argue (my father in law for example) that rhubarb is in fact a weed.  But Caleb likes to chew on it as he's playing in the backyard and he also likes jam... so I figured that making jam out of rhubarb sounded like a interesting experiment to try out at our house.  One afternoon I sent the boys out to the backyard with both Doug-sized and Caleb-sized scissors.  They came back with this.


Once I had the rhubarb sitting on my kitchen counter I decided that the I couldn't use the MGCC recipe... because it didn't actually include any strawberries.  For some reason the thought of consuming jam that was made with only rhubarb was not too appealing... it just looked too "weed-like" sitting there in my kitchen.  So I used the recipe from the certa package.  This was my first jam-making experience-- for some reason I've always thought it was above my level of expertise.  But apparently it wasn't... because it was easy.  And it's delicious... rhubarb and all :)


Caleb agrees.


Jam may not be the healthiest option for my child to consume-- it's pretty much a bit of fruit and a whole lot of sugar.   But I figured my homemade jam is probably better than this:


One night in Superstore (I was alone) I made a big mistake.  I saw this squeeze-able strawberry jam and started to laugh.  Full on laughter there in the aisle of Superstore... all by myself.  Why?  Because I knew how much the boys in my house would love it.  LOVE it.  And love it they did.  Now I can't go to Superstore without Caleb yelling "don't forget the squeezy jam!!!!" over and over again. 

Really, I can't blame Caleb.  Squeezing jam onto your toast is remarkably satisfying and fun.  And the combo of almond butter and "squeezy" jam is quite amazing.

But hopefully the strawberry rhubarb jam, or "mommy jam" as Caleb now calls it... will satisfy for now... Cause we've got a whole lot if it :)

5 comments:

kathleen marie said...

k, so here's the deal. I bake cookies for you, you hand over some of that jam :)

There's a little boy in my house who likes to eat jam by the knife-ful. I would say spoonful, but I tend to catch him mid-act, on the counter, with a butter knife and bread. He somehow forgets the bread is there, and just goes for the jam. :)

Elissa said...

DEAL!!

Graham said...

I've made that same jam before!! YUMMY. I would love to steal some of that rhubarb from you. I love a good rhubarb crisp!!!

Bonnie said...

Sounds deee-lish! I love anything that combines rhubarb & strawberry. YUM.

kelly ens said...

Now all you have to do is put the homemade jam into the squeezable container so he thinks he's getting the store-bought stuff, but in fact, he's getting your homemade jam (which, no matter how much sugar is in it, is always better than store bought, in my opinion).
strawberry and rhubarb anything is tops in my books! :)