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Thursday, August 29, 2013

Cloudberry/Salmonberry/Akpik Jam Recipe

Quick post!

We are busy busy busy, processing meat for the winter, picking berries and freezing them too, prepping the chicken coop, working on vehicles and basically running around babbling and surviving off off coffee and quick meals.

This year I didn't get to do my usual slew of floral jellies but I am going to get to do my berry jellies and jams.  I thought I would share the cloudberry recipe. Cloudberries are the arctic most beloved of berry!  They are also called salmonberries (though they are a different berry) or Akpiks in our language.  This year was a good berry year!


4 cups of berries
1/2 lemon or a couple of tablespoons* of lemon juice
1/2 tablespoon of butter
1/2 packet of Surejell pectin
4 cups sugar

*I guess abit on the amount of lemon juice! You just need a good splash of it in there.

Set aside two cups of the berries - I choose the 'pretty' ones without blemishes and cleaned of leaves and such.  Take the other two cups and press them through a strainer, retrieving as much of the pulp and juice as is possible. Take your time. I repeatedly mix the seed/pulp with water and then press through the strainer.  Take the juice/pulp and add clean water to it to make two cups of juice.

Add this juice and the berries to a small saucepan (big enough to handle twice as much as the juice and berries) . Add lemon juice, and boil for 2 minutes. Add butter and stir till melted (you can omit the butter, it is just there to reduce the amount of foam). Add Surejell and stir and boil for 1 minute.

Add sugar (you can add more sugar, about 6 cups total to get more jam, but I like mine to be more intense berry flavor, do not use less than 4 cups because the sugar is needed to prevent the berries from going bad.)  Boil for another minute while stirring slowly.

Makes about 6 cups of jam, or a little more than 32 oz. 

Notes:

Put in hot sterile jars if you plan to preserve them and you can hot process them in a hot bath to ensure they will stay safe.  I sell some jam online but most of it is eaten up right away and it never lasts long.

You can strain ALL of the seeds out to make a very, very pretty jelly!

You can also save the seeds, grind them up to  powder and mix them with a  little bit of olive and and use them to buff the dead skin away from your face, they contain all types of anti-aging goodness that brighten your skin!

And now some pretty cloudberry pictures!






7 comments:

  1. I love this dish. It is very delicious. Cloudberries are the arctic most beloved of berry!

    Regards,
    Buy Noni Juice

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  2. I've been home sick for a few days and much of that time has been spent scouring your blog. This is really amazing! Easily one of the best blogs I've ever seen, in terms of the quality of writing and imagery, as well as the thoughtful, interesting content. I would totally buy a book of essays by you--just a thought! You could self-publish with Lulu. Maybe even check out Utne Reader or some other magazine to see about getting some of the stuff you already have on this blog republished.

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    Replies
    1. I was actually thinking about rewriting and expanding my essays and publishing them....just waiting for winter to roll around to get the time! i absolutely love thinking about things and chewing the cud. Thank you for taking the time to enjoy my blog!

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  3. Hey! I've been reading your blog for ages (I LOVE IT!) and I wanted to let you know....I nominated you for a Liebster Award! The details are here:

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    It's just a blog tree-type thing, but I thought I would let my readers know that your blog is awesome!

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