Grape Jam...

It took most of the day on Sunday, but I ended up with these beautiful jars of homemade Concord grape jam by dinnertime. Plus, there is still about six pounds of grapes to make juice.

The process for grape jam is labor intense. First you have to squeeze the pulp out of the skins (2 at a time for me), reserving the skins in another bowl. Eight pounds of grapes is a lot of squeezing! Once that's done, the grape pulp is heated until it's tender. Then all of that is put through a chinois to remove the seeds and solids.

While that cooking is going on, the skins are run through a food processor to chop them up. Then they're placed into another pot with about a 1/4 cup of water an cooked down for twenty minutes. After the skins are cooked down, they're added to the pulp, along with sugar, and cooked down until the mixture reaches 220º F. By the time that process is complete, it will be necessary to mop the floor, clean the stovetop, and any adjacent countertops, because the process of boiling down the jam results in what resembles Mt. Vesuvius erupting.

Handsome was my taste-tester while the cooking was going on, and when I'd finished putting all the jam into jars, he made toast to support the last of the jam left in the cooking pot. He immediately declared the jam a winning recipe!

By bedtime, all the jars had sealed and cooled. I'd labeled them, and carefully placed them into the "jelly/jam section" of the pantry...with quite the feeling of accomplishment. I'll process the rest of the grapes in the next day or two.

This week is going to be busy. Handsome has appointments (remember, I'm the chauffeur); I work on Tuesday and Friday evening; this week is our monthly classmate dinner (and one of the guys would like two trays of cinnamon rolls again. Isn't that cute?); I need to make bread; and Saturday is Craft Day in Portage. I know I'll get good sleep when I can.

So, tell me. How is your week looking?