Preserving Summer - Feast Your Eyes

by Alexa Weibel, Posted Aug 20th 2009 @ 10:00AM

Cinnamon-fig jam. Photo: eatingoutloud, flickr.

As summer dwindles to a balmy finish, leaving many of us eagerly anticipating the prospect of jacket-worthy weather, there isn't a better time to consider the not-so-distant future, in which we'll be lamenting the lack of luscious summer fruits.

Those who think ahead may be able to savor the best of both seasons by jarring summer in a delicious jam. An endeavor that turns out to be deceptively easy -- requiring namely the boiling of fruit and sugar combined -- and inexpensive, it's also a remarkably flexible one, open to tastes and preferences. Stick with simple fruits, pairing berries of similar varieties together, or get bold, marrying fresh summer fruits with audacious autumnal flavors and herbs, ranging from cinnamon to rosemary, basil to thyme.

For inspiration, see our own Eric Deisel's peach jam, Eating Out Loud's cinnamon-fig jam (pictured), trusty Martha's sweet-savory peach-rosemary jam, the Washington Post's tart rhubarb-ginger jam, or the endlessly creative "White on Rice" Couple's variety of tomato-based concoctions, particularly their tomato-and-thyme number.

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Filed Under: Feast Your Eyes, Ingredients
Tags: condiments, fruit, jam, peach-rosemary jam, Peach-rosemaryJam, rhubarb-ginger jam, Rhubarb-gingerJam, tomato jam, tomato-thyme jam, Tomato-thymeJam, TomatoJam