Tarragon-lemon roasted chicken

I've got a thriving tarragon plant in the garden. It's become a bit of a mess, as tarragon tends to do. So, I thought I would switch up my usual roast chicken routine and add a bit of tarragon to the mix. If you've never had tarragon, it's an intense herb with a slight licorice-y flavor and a bit of a tingle on the tongue. But even if you don't like licorice, try it anyway, something magical happens when you combine it into a savory dish. Tarragon is the herb used to flavor bearnaise sauce, which is my all-time favorite sauce. I plan to try to harvest the rest of my tarragon in a few weeks, chop it up, and freeze in cubes. (Or I may just make an enormous batch of tarragon butter and freeze that. That's if I don't just eat it all at once, of course.)

Roasting a whole chicken is definitely a time-consuming task, but it's well worth it, and you'll be able to get at least two to four or more meals out of it (meal 1: eat chicken with roasted potatoes; meal 2: make chicken sandwiches; meal 3: pick most of the chicken off the bones and make chicken salad for sandwiches; meal 4: save the carcass in the freezer to make stock another time).

Here's how to do it.

Step 1: Pre-heat the oven to 425 degrees (Fahrenheit). Butter a deep baking dish. Rinse the chicken inside and out with cold water and pat it dry with paper towels.

 
Step 2: Remove leaves from about three sprigs of tarragon and chop them finely. Blend the chopped leaves into about half a cup of softened, salted butter.

Step 3: Salt and pepper the chicken liberally, on both sides and inside the cavity of the chicken.

Step 4: Wash a lemon well. Squeeze out the juice and set it aside. Stuff the remaining lemon halves inside the chicken.

Step 5: Use 2-3 tablespoons of tarragon butter (set the rest aside for another use) and smear it under the skin of the chicken. (To loosen the skin, gently push fingers underneath and detach it from the meat. By the way, this is also a great technique for flavoring your Thanksgiving turkey.)

Step 6: Place the chicken in the buttered baking dish and add about two cups of water to the bottom of the dish to keep the chicken from drying out. (Feel free to pat a little more butter on top of the chicken if you are so inclined.) Slide the pan into the oven and set your timer for 30 minutes.

Step 7: After 30 minutes, take the chicken out of the oven. Sprinkle half of the reserved lemon juice over the top of the chicken. Then turn the chicken over and sprinkle the remaining lemon juice over the other side. (My only advice for turning the chicken? Use two large spoons or spatulas and be careful. It's not an elegant operation.)

Step 8: From this point on, turn the chicken every 20 minutes or so. Make sure to spend 2-3 minutes spooning the liquid in the baking dish over both sides of the chicken. The chicken will be done in about 2 hours and 15 minutes (to check for doneness, use either a thermometer or stick a fork or knife into the thickest part of the thigh, if the juices run clear, the chicken is fully cooked).

Step 9: When the chicken is fully cooked, remove it from the oven and let it rest for at least 10 minutes before serving it. In the meantime, you can make gravy with the pan drippings if you so desire.

Simple pan gravy:

1. Pour the pan drippings into a separator cup and let the drippings divide into two layers. (The top layer will be the fat layer.) Spoon off about 3 Tbsps of the fat and add it to a pan. 
2. Add 3 Tbsps flour to the hot fat. Let the mixture cook for a couple of minutes. 
3. Whisking continuously, add the liquid part of the pan drippings (should be about 1 to 1.5 cups) to the fat-flour mixture in the pan. Let the gravy thicken over medium heat. If the gravy is too salty, add a little cream or half-and-half. 

Strawberry-lemonade jam

When you start making your own food from scratch, especially stuff like bread and mayonnaise, you take a whole lot of pride in what you've accomplished. But it wears off. Eventually baking your own bread doesn't feel so special anymore; it's just a regular part of your week. And once you get the hang of making mayo, you kind of feel like, "Hey, no big."

So far I haven't reached that point with making jam. (And I hope I never do.) Here I am, glowing with pride while eight jars of gorgeous jam cool in the kitchen (plus a little extra insufficient to fill a jar). I decided to call it strawberry-lemonade jam because I love strawberry lemonade (and I thought it sounded good), but really it's strawberry jam flavored with lemon zest, lemon juice, and a hint of lemon verbena to cut the sweetness. It's delicious. And I was able to keep the color of the strawberries--a first in jam making for me. So I am a little puffed up. Let me enjoy my moment of glory. Wait, I have to run to the kitchen and get a spoonful from the partial jar...

Man that's good. Sorry, I'm back. That was wonderful. I am going to tell you how to make the deliciousness yourself in a moment, but first a few tips for making jam:

• Get the very best berries you can find and preferably ones that haven't been sprayed. I got mine from Reid's Orchard because their berries are extraordinarily good, and they practice integrated pest management, which means they rarely spray their fruits.
• Jam is not an excuse for using less-than-perfect berries. If you've got ugly berries, trim the ugly parts and try making saft (a Swedish fruit syrup that's delicious as a refreshing drink when mixed with water or you could also pour a little over ice cream). Or bake something with them.
• Get everything ready before you start cooking the jam, because once you start you will not be able to leave the stove for more than a minute or two. (Lot of hovering over the stove involved in making jam.) So that means wash and sterilize all your jars, juice and zest your lemons, wash the verbena stems, place a plate with five metal spoons in the freezer for testing, and have a ladle and a funnel ready to go.
• Be careful. Making jam is an activity not dissimilar to making candy. That means temperatures get very high, boiling can get violent, and the jam can overflow. Also, it can spatter and burn, so take care. Maybe wear an oven mitt while you stir. Or cast caution to the wind and gain some badges of honor (I got one on my wrist today).  
• Don't start making jam unless you have at least 45 solid minutes to devote completely to the task. You can't really start and stop, and you have to be present at the stove through nearly the entire cook time.    

OK, so those are the general tips. Here are the specifics (both ingredients and equipment):

• 4 lbs hulled strawberries (keep them whole unless they are huge)
• 2 lbs 10 oz sugar 
• juice from four lemons (between 5 and 6 ounces, divided)*
• zest from two lemons (finely chopped or grated)
• 1 large branch of lemon verbena (optional, but nice)
• 1 white plate with 5 metal spoons, placed in the freezer to prep them for testing
• 1 deep thick-bottomed pot that's from 8 inches in diameter (up to 11 or 12) (if you don't have a jam pan,** a stock pot will work just fine)
• 1 silicone spatula
• 1 skimmer, placed in a bowl of cold water
• 1 ladle
• 1 wide-mouth funnel (you'll usually find these wherever you find canning supplies)
• 9 clean 8-ounce jars with banded lids, washed, sterilized, and kept hot
• Any equipment you are using to process the jars (pot with rack, baking sheet and rack, etc.). For information about processing jams (and any canned good) safely, go to the National Center for Home Food Preservation.      

OK, now that you have assembled everything you need, let's get started:

1. Combine strawberries, sugar, and half of the lemon juice in a pot. Stirring steadily with the silicone spatula, slowly heat the mass. When the berries release a lot of liquid and the berry-sugar mass becomes more liquid, raise the heat slowly to high and bring the mass to a rolling boil. 
2. Maintain the berry-sugar mix at a high boil for about 25 minutes, stirring once a minute or so, making sure to scrape the bottom with the spatula. If the mass starts to stick to the bottom, lower the heat a bit. Using a skimmer, skim the scum off the top for the first 10 minutes. As you will be standing here for a while watching the mass boil, you will no doubt notice some changes in the jam: First, it will boil up very high, possibly threatening to boil over. Usually consistent stirring will help keep that from happening, but it doesn't always work. Adjust the heat up and down as you work to maintain a strong boil, while avoiding losing half your jam in a sticky, possibly painful, disaster. 
3. At about the 25-minute mark, the jam will change color, growing darker and glossier, and production of foam will decrease. (Before this, you will notice the jam feeling thicker and the intensity of the boiling increasing.) Mix in the second half of the lemon juice and the lemon zest. (Take the pot off the heating element when you do this to avoid scorching.) Bring the jam back to a high boil for 5 minutes. 
4. After the 5 minutes, take the pot off the heat and add the sprig of lemon verbena to let it steep while you test the jam. To test the jam, place a small amount of jam liquid on a frozen spoon and return it to the freezer for 3-4 minutes. When you take the spoon out, feel the bottom of the spoon, it shouldn't feel hot or cold. If that's the case, tip the spoon to let the liquid run. If it runs slowly and sort of gums up a bit, the jam is done. If it runs fast, let the jam cook for another 5 to 10 minutes and test it again. 
5. If the jam was done on your first try, let the lemon verbena steep for another 5 to 10 minutes. Before you put the jam into the jars, remove the lemon verbena and toss it.
6. Using the ladle, pour the jam into the sterilized jars, leaving 1/4 inch room at the top of the jar. You will get 7 to 9 8-ounce jars of jam. 
7. Process the jars as directed. Except maybe one that you set aside to "test" for flavor to make sure it's OK. Make sure to refrigerate any open jars. 
8. Enjoy it. It should be good for 6 to 8 months if the jars form a proper seal and are kept in a cool, dark place. Make sure to check each jar carefully when you open it. If the seal doesn't pop, or if anything seems off or weird in any way (color, smell, rusty lids, etc.), just get rid of it. Better to lose a jar than to get sick.   

* The basis for this recipe is Rachel Saunders's "Children's Strawberry Jam," from The Blue Chair Jam Cookbook.
** If anyone feels like getting me a jam pan for Christmas, or for any other reason, I would not mind. No really. I wouldn't.

Strawberry upside-down cake

I like making upside-down cakes. They can be a bit of a gamble: Will the whole thing come out of the pan beautifully, or will it crumble into a delicious, but hideous mess? When they come out well, they can be so beautiful: Glorious jewel-like fruit glistening in deep-brown caramel both gooey and with a lacy edge of crispness. Then there is the contrast of the slight hit of acid from the fruit against soft sweet cake. Oh yeah...

The other thing I like about them is that they are endlessly variable. Once you get a basic batter and caramel down, you can switch up the fruit and the flavor of the batter in nearly endless ways (which just sparked an idea about inventing a savory upside-down cake at some point--maybe later this summer with tomatoes and some of the beautiful goat cheese from Cherry Glen--but I digress). For example, during summer you could use peaches, plums, cherries, blackberries--whatever is fresh and good and loading down the tables at the farmer's market. In fall, you could use apples, pears, and cranberries. To complement different fruits, you could flavor the batter with lemon zest, cinnamon, cardamom, vanilla--whatever strikes your fancy and suits your tastes.

In this case, my fancy was struck when I went looking for strawberry-intensive recipes for a treat to bring to a brunch. I came across several tasty ones at Joy the Baker's blog, including a brown butter banana strawberry bread (looks so delicious) and a strawberry balsamic flatbread (most intriguing), but what really sparked my thinking was the strawberry upside-down cake with cardamom. Oh yeah! I could make an upside-down cake with strawberries. Only, instead of using cardamom, I would caramelize the strawberries, and instead of cinnamon in my batter, I would use lemon zest because lemon and strawberries just play so nicely together. Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy.

So I got to work. I had a quart of strawberries from the farmer's market to hull (I bought two actually, but the other one is for eating fresh), caramel to make, and a batter to whip up. Here's how to proceed.*

Topping

• 6 Tbsp unsalted butter
• 1 packed cup brown sugar
• 1 Tbsp local honey
• 1 quart strawberries, hulled and sliced 

(If you aren't using a cast-iron skillet to make this cake, make the caramel separately on the stove and then pour it into the cake pan you plan to use; use an 8- to 9-inch pan. Springform would probably help you out a bunch.)

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. 
2. Melt the butter, let it get foamy and slightly brown. (Keep an eye on it, you do not want burnt butter in your cake. Or in any dish you make, ever.)
3. Add brown sugar and honey and stir until the brown sugar is mostly melted. 
4. Take the pan off the heat and add the strawberries. (The heat of the sugar-butter mixture will slightly cook the strawberries, and a scent will rise that is indescribably beautiful. Just breathe it in and count yourself lucky to experience such a thing of ephemeral beauty.) If you are using a cake pan, pour the whole mixture into the pan. Set it aside while you make the batter.   

Cake Batter

• 6 Tbsp butter, room temperature
• 1 cup white sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• zest from one lemon, finely chopped or grated
• 1/2 cup whole milk

1. Using a stand mixer, whip the butter silly. No. Sorry. Whip the butter until it's fluffy. The paddle attachment is good for this.  
2. Add the sugar to the butter and whip that until it's creamy. If you are starting with cold butter, this could take a while.
3. While the butter and sugar are working, add flour, baking powder, salt, and lemon zest to a bowl. Mix everything together with a whisk and set it aside. 
4. OK, now that your butter and sugar is fluffy and pale gold, add one egg at a time. Beat them into the butter-sugar mixture until fluffy. Even more fluffy! Lots of fluffy. 
5. Next, mix in the vanilla extract. 
6. Finally add the flour mixture and the milk, alternating between about a third of the flour and a third of the milk until you've added it all. Mix until the flour and the milk are just incorporated and then stop the machine. (If you keep beating the batter, you will get a tough cake. And you don't want a tough cake unless you are planning to throw it at someone you are mad at. And why would you be mad at someone? You have these gorgeous strawberries and this fluffy cake batter.)
7. Scrape the batter over the strawberries and caramel and smooth the batter as best you can (this is a thick batter that doesn't spread very easily, but don't worry about it being uneven; it will spread nicely in the oven). 
8. Slide the pan into the hot oven and let it bake for 1 hour and 5 minutes. Take it out and let it cool for 30 minutes before flipping it over onto a serving plate. Enjoy it warm or cold. Serve it with ice cream or some fresh whipped cream or all by itself.

* This recipe was adapted from this oh-so-good plum upside-down cake from Epicurious.

Jam update: How I went wrong and a recipe for peach-plum jam

A while back I wrote about making blueberry jam with maple syrup and lemon zest, but I have learned much about jam-making since then and I must confess that I was wrong. The basic recipe is just fine, but it turns out my technique could use a lot of improvement.

Now, you ask me, "Tora, how did you find out you were wrong? What should we be doing differently?"

Well, about two weeks ago (I think it was two weeks ago), Mike, Sebastian, and I decided we would go to Borders and see if we could find anything good at the going-out-of-business sale. We don't usually pick over scraps of dying stores like vultures, but it's a book store. If there was a 10-step program for book addiction, we might be candidates for it.

As we looked around, Mike found a book that he thought I might like: The Blue Chair Jam Cookbook by Rachel Saunders. This charming, lovely book is probably all you will ever need to become a master jam/jelly/marmalade maker. It has gorgeous photos, lots of great information about techniques, and recipes that range from the utterly simply and sublime to the complex and sophisticated. And within about 10 minutes of sitting down to read, I discovered that I have been doing it wrong. So, let me explain my mistakes and pass on some of my new-found knowledge to you.

1. I've been using the wrong kind of pot. Ideally, you should use a copper pan that's 11 inches at the base, 15 inches at the rim, and 5 inches high with a 11- to 12-quart capacity. Now, copper pans are not currently in my budget, as dearly as I would love to have one. What I gleaned from this information is that I need a lot more surface area. So I broke out my stock pot, which is definitely deep enough and has a 10-inch diameter. Not perfect, but I've already gotten better results. (If anyone feels especially generous, a copper pan would be a much appreciated Christmas gift.)
2. I've been using the wrong application of heat. Instead of low and slow, I should be cooking this stuff hot and fast to keep as much of the fruit's flavor and texture intact. The correct way to do it is to heat the mixture of fruit and sugar slowly at first, just until it starts to bubble and release a lot of juice, and then crank up the heat to get it up to a pretty fierce boil. What you are trying to accomplish is a lot of evaporation (which explains why you need a lot of surface area in your pan). While it cooks, you need to keep stirring frequently, both to aid evaporation and to ensure that the jam doesn't stick to the bottom and burn. Note that this will be extremely messy.
3. My testing for doneness has a lot to be desired. Rachel Saunders suggests doing this instead: Place a saucer with five metal spoons in the freezer. When you are ready to test your jam for doneness, take your pot off the heat, transfer a small amount of jam to one of the frozen spoons and return it to the freezer for a minute or two. When the bottom of the spoon feels neither hot nor cold, inspect the sample in the spoon. It shouldn't run but sort of clump up in a jelly-like blob on the spoon. If it doesn't, discard test spoon 1 and put the pot back on the heat for another five minutes or so and test again. The cooking process for jam (there are differences for jelly and marmalade, so be aware of that) will take about 15-30 minutes tops. 
4. I like her method of preparing the jars for preservation, but I am still not completely sold on it. Usually, I would transfer jam to hot sterilized jars that I have boiled, place the lids on them, and boil them for another 15 minutes. She recommends sterilizing the washed jars in a 250-degree oven for at least 30 minutes, adding the jam, closing the jars, and placing them back in the oven for another 15 minutes. It's a lot easier method than boiling the jars, but so far, every batch I have made this way has had at least one jar that didn't seal. Of course, that means I get to try the jam right away, which is great, but it rankles a little bit. 
5. The last clear technique difference is her method of flavoring the jam with herbs. I like to wrap up my herbs in a piece of cheesecloth and let it boil in the jam, whereas she prefers to add sprigs and let them steep in the hot jam for a few minutes after cooking and then fish them out. I haven't made up my mind on this one yet. I tried her method, adding some basil to a recent batch of plum-peach jam after it had cooked, but although the basil was extraordinarily fragrant (from my garden!), I can't taste it in the jam at all. So I will probably experiment a bit more before making my decision one way or another. 

I've applied these modifications to three recent batches of jam—blackberry with lemon verbena, peach-plum with basil, and my blueberry with maple syrup and lemon—and I am definitely getting better results. The texture is better, the flavor is brighter, and the set is much better. I also love that I can get a jam in a lot less time. What's a bit of drag is that the yield seems to be a bit smaller, but I can live with that to get awesome jam. Here's a recipe for a jam experiment I tried with plums and peaches. The flavor is beautiful: bright, fruity, a little tangy, basically everything you get from a really good peach or plum eaten while dripping over a sink at the height of summer.  

Peach-plum jam with basil  

Yields about four eight-ounce jars 

• 500 grams peaches, peeled, cut into 1-inch pieces (discard the stones)
• 500 grams plums, cut into quarters (discard the stones) (any kind of plum will probably work for this, but I used red plums, which created a dark red jam; just be mindful that if you use, for example, greengages, the color may not be very pretty)
• 6 deciliters sugar
• juice from two lemons
• 4-5 basil stems (optional, but nice)

1. Background prep: Place a saucer with five metal spoons in the freezer, and sterilize your jars using whatever technique you prefer (keep them hot as you make the jam).
2. Layer the fruit and sugar in your jam pot (starting and ending with a layer of sugar).
3. Let the fruit-sugar mixture sit for at least an hour, up to overnight (refrigerate if you want to do this).
4. Add the lemon juice.
5. Heat the mixture slowly until the fruit produces a lot of juice, and it has started to bubble. 
6. Bring the heat up to high and stir continually to keep the jam from burning. Expect copious amounts of steam and a lot of spatter. If you have an apron, this would be a good time to wear it. (I really need to get one of those.)
7. Cook at high heat for about 15 minutes (skim off the foam).
8. Test for doneness: Take the pot off the heat, get a sample of jam from the pot and transfer it to a frozen spoon. Place the sample in the freezer for a minute or two. Touch the bottom of the spoon, if it's neither hot nor cold, it's time to inspect the doneness of the jam. It should not run, but be gelatinous. If it runs, put the jam back on the heat for another five minutes and test again. Keep testing until you reach doneness.
9. When the jam is done, take it off the heat and add your basil sprigs and let it sit for five to 10 minutes. Then remove the basil and pour the hot jam into your hot jars (be sure to leave at least an inch at the top) and sterilize them, using a hot water bath or oven as you prefer. 
10. When you let the jars cool, you will hear little popping noises as they create a vacuum seal. If one of the jars doesn't seal (you can tell if you can depress the lid with your finger and it pops up again), just let it cool and enjoy it right away. The rest will be good for several months. 

A note on cooling: Don't move jam around a lot while it cools. One of the things it does as it cools is creates a sort of lattice structure. If you disturb that structure while it's forming, the jam won't set very well (or possibly at all).

Update: Check out the National Center for Home Food Preservation for more information about keeping your jams and jellies safe. 

My grandmother's pancakes

That's my Icelandic grandmother, or Amma, on the far left in the tweed suit, holding a fur hat in her hand. This picture was probably taken when I was about six or seven, at least 33 years ago. That's me on the far right, in the rust-red pants, brown turtleneck, leg cocked back slightly. Between me and my grandmother are my uncle, his two first children, my grandfather (Afi), and my aunt. I am not sure who stands behind my aunt. This was taken somewhere in Iceland. We are on a picnic. Perhaps we are here to pick blueberries or krækiberjum (crowberries); I imagine we are.


My grandmother's clothes in this photo interest me. She is dressed so well for a trip to a wild meadow surrounded by distant mountains. Did she always dress this nicely when going out, regardless of where she was going? I honestly can't remember. My memories of her only come in bits and pieces now: a glimpse of her through the glass upon landing at the old Reykjavik airport, her bundling me up in a thick woolen Icelandic sweater to keep me warm, the teddy bears she knitted for me, her calling me by my cousin's name when illness had devastated her memory. She had a soft round face with a little peach fuzz on her skin and usually wore her hair in a net. But these memories are so deeply inadequate to suggest a person's life or what she meant to me. Here's my only other photo of her, with me and Afi on a boat in Sweden:

Food memories stand in for much that I've never really known about my grandparents. For example, Afi and Amma always bought a particular brand of chocolate-flavored cereal when I came to visit. I think they bought it just for me, and I loved it. Even though I no longer eat processed cereal, when I smell that particular brand of cereal, and it has a very particular smell, I find myself back at their small kitchen table, eating out of the bowl with the picture at the bottom. I see my grandfather winding up a toy with a key and kneeling down stiffly to set it loose on the kitchen floor. I see all kinds of details about their apartment: the glass doors to the dining room with the etched fish and bubbles, the cuckoo clocks, the couch stuffed with so many decorative cushions no one could sit on it, the blue cot I slept on, the textured concrete of the balcony. Outside was a gray and green world that smelled of fish and harbor. 


Inside fresh, cold air wafted through the lace curtain at an open window, the sounds of traffic rose from the road below, and a huge stack of thin pancakes grew in the kitchen. Now my family calls these pancakes Swedish pancakes. I don't know how or why that happened. I always liked them, the pancakes, but I had no idea they would leave me with such powerful sense memories. In essence, they are thin, sweet crepes with a slightly lemony flavor, but to me they represent memories of Iceland, of the vast banquets of cakes, kleinur, cookies, sweets, and pea and carrot salad on crackers served as just a little afternoon "coffee." We seemed to have these little coffees every day at every relative's house. The pancakes were also served as a special occasion dessert with whipped cream and jam. We had them as picnic food, sprinkling on sugar and rolling them into tubes like cigars. The crunch of the raw sugar at the center of a soft pancake roll makes the memories for me. 

The ingredients are simple enough, but these pancakes take a little practice to get right. It also takes a little experimentation with your equipment. It took me several tries with various spatulas and pans and measures until I found just the right way to make them. They should be very thin with a fine lace edge. They should be browned just right on both sides.

The ingredients:

• 2 medium eggs
• 3 deciliters milk
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1 Tbsp sugar
• 1.5 deciliters all-purpose flour
• zest of one lemon
• 4 Tbsp butter (divided)

The equipment:

• medium bowl
• balloon whisk
• fine zester
• 1/4 cup measuring cup
• frying pan about 8-9 inches in diameter
• a pastry brush
• a small sauce pan
• a hard spatula that covers at least half the pan.

Now, for some explanations for the equipment choices. Bowl, whisk, zester? Well, what do you think? The size of the measuring cup and the pan, however, do matter. If you just barely fill the measuring cup, you will get the perfect amount of batter to spread across your pan. Pan size also matters. If it is too big, the batter will set before you have time to coat it with batter. Too small, and the pancake will be too thick. With the right size pan and a bare quarter cup of batter, you'll get just the right thickness every time. Spatula size also really matters here, because you want it to support as much as possible of your pancake so that you can easily flip it.  Pastry brush and small sauce pan are for buttering the pan every time you start a new pancake. Don't assume there's going to be enough butter left in the pan; there won't be.

Now, how do you make the pancakes? First off, make the batter: Melt 4 tablespoons butter in a small sauce pan. Mix milk and eggs in your bowl and whisk in 2 tablespoons melted butter (the butter will look curdled because it will get cold in the milk; don't worry about it as long as it's somewhat evenly dispersed). (Leave the remaining butter in the sauce pan on low temperature.) Mix salt, sugar, and flour together and add the flour mixture in batches to the liquid, whisking continuously to avoid lumps (small lumps are not a problem; if you get big ones, you'll probably need to strain the batter). Whisk in the lemon zest. Voila, batter! 

  

Next, make the pancakes. Heat your 8-9 inch frying pan on medium heat. Give it at least five minutes to let it get hot enough and to even out the temperature. Brush the pan with melted butter (just the barest amount to cover the pan, but not pool). It will sizzle a bit. 

Add just slightly less than 1/4 cup of the batter to the pan. Quickly swirl the batter around to coat the pan. If you get a hole or two, don't fret, it will still taste wonderful, just try to cover the pan as evenly as possible. 

Let it cook for about a minute or two. Feel around the edges with the spatula, once you are able to get the spatula under the pancake without tearing it, take a peek at the underside.

When you like the color, get the spatula as far under the pancake as you can and turn it over. You can help a little with your other hand as needed. Also, if it sort of lands in the pan a little folded, all is not lost, you can shake the pan around and straighten out the pancake. Then cook until you like the color on the underside (another minute or two). Transfer the pancake to a plate. Then start from the beginning again: brush the pan with a little bit of melted butter...

It does take a little practice to make them pretty, but even if you rip and tear the first ones, don't worry about it. They will still be good. Serve rolled up with sugar. Serve with maple syrup. Serve with jam and whipped cream. Eat them straight. Or eliminate the sugar in the batter and serve with a savory filling. Just enjoy them. 

Blueberry jam with maple syrup and lemon zest

For some updates on techniques and a recipe for plum-peach jam with basil, click here. 

I haven't posted in a while. For the Independence Day weekend, Mike, Sebastian, and I drove to Auburn Hills, Michigan (a little north of Detroit) to visit Mike's sister, her family, and their dad for the holiday (the drive takes 10 and a half hours; my little boy is a champ!). Instead of cooking and eating good local food, we subsisted mainly on junk food and candy bought at rest stops along the Pennsylvania and Ohio turnpikes, feeling bloated and gross the whole way. (Sebastian, of course, loved this, but the guy is four, so I can't blame him for having tastes geared primarily toward straight-up salt and sugar.) I did have one really excellent meal: My brother-in-law Russ made some amazing fall-off-the-bone ribs and served them with BBQ sauce, grilled corn, and baked beans. We gorged ourselves on these delectable treats and moaned with discomfort for several hours after dinner. It was totally worth it.

Before we left, I had wanted to make a batch of blueberry jam to make sure that the harvest didn't go by without preserving at least some of it, but I ran out of time. I love blueberries. They may be my favorite berry. I am especially fond of wild lowbush blueberries, but they are hard to come by here in Virginia. When I was a kid in Sweden, I spent much of my time roaming around the woods like a small wild animal, getting damp and muddy and pretending I was a hero of some kind: a knight one day, Robin Hood the next. In my long rambles, I discovered treasured spots where wild blueberries grew in great masses, and I spent many hours seated among the plants, plucking berry after berry and savoring each one. I miss my blueberry spots, especially now that I cook. If only I could wander out into the woods and collect and gather blueberries, bring them home, and preserve them for winter. (I was told once that my Icelandic grandfather Sigurdur was a legendary berry picker; he could fill baskets faster than anyone, fingers moving so fast they blurred.)

But I must settle for domesticated highbush berries, which produce larger fruits that are not quite as deeply flavorful (still good, but not magic). Thankfully, one of my favorite farms, Reid's Orchard, grows berries and fruit organically (although they aren't certified), using integrated pest management techniques and caring for their soil and land in a way that will preserve it for the future (and it shows, just take a look at their peaches--they taste and smell as good as they look).

After recovering from the Michigan trip for a few days, I finally made it out of the house to get food on a steamy Thursday. I went to the Herndon farmer's market and decided to get some blueberries from Reid's. I lucked out because they had a lot of them, so I bought six pints. I had had this idea of making jam flavored with maple syrup and lemon zest. Foods from the same area often taste particularly good together--and sugar maples typically live where blueberries grow, so the combination sounded good. Obviously lemons and blueberries violate that principle, but they are good together. The acidity of the lemon just sparks the flavor of blueberries (as lemons do with so many things).

It was actually so hot and humid the day I bought the blueberries that my camera fogged up. 

So here's how I made my blueberry jam with maple syrup and lemon zest. I started with

• 3 liters blueberries, picked over to remove any soft berries, stems, leaves, or anything else you wouldn't want to eat, rinsed, and finally drip-dried for 10 minutes or so (better yet, use a scale, you should have 1.5 kilos of berries) 
• 700 milliliters sugar
• 200 milliliters real maple syrup
• 1 lemon, washed
• 1 tablespoon pectin, mixed with a little water to make a smooth paste

I spread a layer of sugar on the bottom of the pot I planned to use for jamming.

Then I layered blueberries over the sugar, added another layer of sugar, and zested some lemon over the sugar.

At the second layer, I added the maple syrup instead of sugar and zested some more. 

I added more berries and ended with a final layer of sugar and zest. (In other words, one layer of sugar on the bottom of the pot and one to top it all off.)

I covered the berries and sugar with the lid (ants are quite a problem in summer) and let it sit for a little over an hour (you could let it sit up to 24 hours in the refrigerator). Then I set the pot on low heat. At first, not much happened but eventually I could see a rim of liquified berry juice starting to rise around the edges of the pot, followed by a completely wet mass slowly simmering away. (Note that this isn't a project you do quickly, it can take several hours to reach the jelling point. Pick a lazy, rainy day when you aren't going to leave the house to make the jam. Maybe make some bread while you are at it.) 

  

I added the mixture of pectin and water to the pot and let the mass just simmer away. (At one point, I did get a boil over, so I had to turn down the heat a bit. Almost anything that's made with a lot of sugar has a tendency to get feisty if too much heat is applied.) I skimmed regularly. (Once when making jam as a kid, I made the mistake of not skimming. It left the finished product with a very unpleasant, bitter aftertaste. So if you decide to make jam, don't skimp on skimming.) Oh, and here's a tip to ease your skimming: Keep a bowl of cold water near the stove, dip your skimmer into the cold water before you skim, and then clean off the scum in the cold water, and skim again. You will probably want to replace the water from time to time. 

While the mass simmered, I cleaned and sterilized my jars in boiling water. (You can re-use your jars, but you must use new lids every time. The rubber that creates the seal doesn't hold up to multiple uses. You can probably find boxes of lids where you would buy other canning/jamming equipment.)

You can keep the jars in the hot water on low while your jam continues to simmer. Eventually, I started testing my jam to see if it was ready. How to test for readiness? Get a teaspoon of the liquid in the pot and spread it on a plate. Let it cool for a few minutes, and scrape your spoon through the smear on the plate. If the liquid immediately fills in the lines where the spoon scraped through, you are nowhere near done. If the lines don't fill in immediately, but do eventually, you are getting closer but you aren't there yet. If it bunches up into a jelly-like mass, you are ready to go.

When the spoon scrapes through, the liquid immediately refills the line. This is nowhere near done. 

The liquid isn't filling in as quickly now. The white of the plate shows just a little longer. Progress, but not done. 

The liquid no longer fills in where the spoon has scraped through, and you can create a little clump of jelly. Finished!

When the jam had reached the point where it was finished, I added the juice from the lemon (both for flavor and to help preserve the jam). (I strained it to make sure I wasn't adding seeds.) Then the next step was to add the jam to my warm and clean jars, close up the jars, and boil the jars to vacuum seal them. 

One thing to remember when you add the jam to the jars: Always leave at least an inch of space at the top of the jar. Otherwise, you won't be able to create an effective vacuum. And the vacuum is one of the main reasons that these jars will last for up to year. (That is, if you don't eat them before then. I am almost out of the strawberry jam I made already!)

I've wrapped my jars in newspaper because I don't have a rack to keep the jars stable (yet). 

Ah, pride and joy!

Update: To make sure your jams and jellies are safe to eat, check out the National Center for Home Food Preservation.