I took Heather back to Dublin to catch BART. Her cat Tyrone is welcome on BART but not on Amtrak. Me driving to Dublin and her catching and returning to Dublin is about equal time. I just arrived at home and she texted mom telling her that she had arrived.
It is so much fun to have the girls home.
Lindsay and I made strawberry jam this weekend. We made it indoors for the first time.We bought our berries at our favorite Hmong outlet. The berries were not as sweet as usual,which played into our jam strategy. There were pretty dusty too, due to the strong winds we had earlier this last week. With a dunk in the water the grit came off. We bought a full flat and a half. We used basically one flat for the jam.
All of our tools are still scattered in boxes in storage and other places like the garage. The outdoor gas stove is not yet in commission.
We stumbled ahead without a perfect set up. One thing that was was missing that is very essential is a jar clamp. It is used to pick up the jars and put them in the boiling water. It is also needed to get them out. After a little trial and error and a minor injury, (I hope) we started using a Chinesse copper fry scooper to get the half pint jars out of the water. Things got a little exciting around the burners too. I was cooking the jam in a stainless steel pot instead of a big aluminum pot which would allow more careful control of the heat. We had a boil over.. eegads. Everything came off pretty easily.. so no harm done. The aluminum pot was cooking up the water for the sterilization and the 10 minutes under boiling water each jar received.
We ended up with a two cases of half pint strawberry jam (24) plus alot more that never found a jar.. at least not yet. It will be refrige jam.
Hope you had fun this holiday weekend.
Pat
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