It started several decades ago. As a teacher, I was fortunate to spend most of the summer at the cottage with my Mom, Dad and daughters (they loved spending time with Grandma and Grandpa). Grandpa loved homemade jam, so the day after school ended, my girls and I would pick strawberries at a local farm, pack up the car, drive up to the cottage and the fun would begin.
We all washed and sterilized the jars and lids. Mom cleaned the berries, the girls squashed and measured. I stirred and boiled the jam and Dad was in charge of the skimming (so he could save the bubbly berry sweetness to top his ice cream!). Then we all filled the jars, sealed them up and got them labeled.
For the rest of the year we all enjoyed our taste of summer.
Sadly Mom and Dad have passed on and my sister and I are the Grandmas at the cottage now. I continued to make jam each year, usually at home, but now as my sister and I are both retired, we’ve revived the cottage jam session. Our grand babies are too young to help but we can sometimes enlist help from or daughters or husbands.
We order a flats of berries from Mcleans at the Minden farmer’s market as our berry picking days are long gone too. We both sterilize the jars and clean the berries. We take turns stirring, skimming and both work to get the jam into jars and labeled. Our families and friends can enjoy the taste of summer all year long. We even clean, measure and freeze batches of berries so we can replenish our jam supply later if we run out.
The recipe? Easy you’ll find it in every box of Certo.
Post by Michelle, Fairfield Bay
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