Chocolate Jams

Happy Valentine's Day!    We're whipping up a quick batch of Chocolate Raspberry Jam to have with our treats today and it reminded me that it's time to do a quick review of the Chocolate Jams that I've done on the blog.   

You can make any fruit jam into a chocolate jam.  We've used a few different methods.  The easiest is to heat up 8 oz or so of your favorite fruit jam and then stir in 1/3 cup of chocolate chips until they're all melted.  





Here are the jams we've loved.

• Chocolate Cherry Jam
• Chocolate Orange Jam
• Chocolate Pear Ginger Jam
• Chocolate Raspberry Jam

I hope you get a chance to try one this weekend. Enjoy!  

Chocolate Cherry Jam

There's something about Valentine's Day that just screams chocolate to me. 

CHOCOLATE!!

Last year I made three chocolate jams using chocolate bars, chocolate chips and cocoa powder as I was making the jam to begin with.  [btw:  chocolate chips are the easiest way to put chocolate in your jam.]

This year I wanted to try chocolate cherry, because it sounded good.  [So, I saved a jar of my cherry jam from last year just for this very reason and I had to defend that jar all year long from nameless people who live here with threats of  No Jam At All Ever Again if anyone touched my last jar of cherry jam.  It worked.]

I especially wanted to see if I could take a jar of jam already made and turn it into chocolate jam pretty easily.   

Yep.   I could. 

And I'm telling you, this stuff on bread is To. Die. For.   It's the bread and chocolate thing on a whole 'nother level.     Drumroll, please.....

Chocolate Cherry Jam
www.rurification.com

1 jar cherry jam [8-12 oz, whatever]
1/4 cup chocolate chips

Put the jam in a bowl with the chocolate chips.  Microwave for 1 minute.   Stir until smooth.

The End.

Really.   That's it.  

I know!

I know!

Why didn't I think of this sooner??

Don't stress out about the exact size of jar.   If there's more or less jam or chocolate, no one will care. 

You could do this with orange marmalade.   Raspberry jam.   Pear ginger jam.   Strawberry jam.  

You guys!!   Breakfast.  Valentine's Day. 

If you want the recipes for the jams I made last year, here ya go:

Chocolate Pear Ginger Jam
Chocolate Orange Jam
Chocolate Raspberry Jam


Want the recipe for this Chocolate Jam and a whole lot of other terrific jam recipes?   Check out my ebook:  A Simple Jar of Jam  at www.rurification.etsy.com.   You can preview the book by clicking the link on the sidebar.  Every purchase helps support this site.  Thank you!

Lulu's Cookies

I mentioned before that the girls had been working on recipes for the Nancy Drew HER interactive recipe contest.    They had time for just one more entry last week, so they whipped up a small batch of these chocolate wonders.

They are a very nice variation of Chocolate Chocolate Chip cookies, with the addition of craisins and pecans.   These were fantastic and they disappeared fast.



The name comes from one of the Nancy Drew games.  Lulu is a rather obnoxious parrot who loves snacks.


Lulu's Cookies
www.rurification.com

1/2 cup butter, softened
3/4 cups sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup flour
1/3 cup cocoa
3/8 teaspoon baking soda
1/3 cup chocolate chips
1/3 cup dried cranberries
1/3 cup chopped pecans
2 Tablespoons white chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 350.
Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg and vanilla extract. Mix in the flour, baking soda, and cocoa. Fold in the chocolate chips, cranberries, and nuts.  Using a spoon or melon baller, drop 1-inch balls of dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes. Makes about 2 dozen cookies.

Cherry Pie Filling Experiments with Perma Flo

My blackberry pie filling [see yesterday's post] was so easy and so successful that I immediately started making plans to use up some of the fruit in the freezer in shelf stable canned pie filling.   Seriously, the freezer was so full the kids were starting to threaten me any time I talked about getting more fresh fruit.

Mom.  MOM!  There's no room in the freezer.

NO ROOM.   None.   It's full to bursting.   Really.

So I told them to pull out 4 bags of cherries and I'd make cherry pie filling with a gallon of cherries I just got from Freedom Country Store the same way I'd made pie filling with a gallon of blackberries.

I did exactly the same thing only used twice as much sugar since they were sour cherries.  It didn't go as well as I thought.

Cherry Pie Filling Syrup with Perma Flo
www.rurification.com

1 gallon frozen cherries
3 quarts water
1 cup rounded Perma Flo
6 cups sugar  

Step 1.  Bring the liquid to a boil.   I put 3 quarts of water in a pot and 1 quart of the cherries and brought that to a boil.   I mashed the cherries while I was at it to release the juices.

Step 2.  Whisk in the Perma Flo.   I used 1/4 cup per quart of fruit.   1 gallon of cherries needed 1 cup of Perma Flo. I rounded the cup. 

Step 3.  Stir until it starts to thicken.  It took a few minutes.

Step 4.  Add fruit [the rest of the gallon of cherries], sugar [6 cups] and return to boil.

Step 5.  Put in clean jars, wipe rims, top with clean lids and rings.

Step 6.  Process jars for 30 minutes.  The NCHFP recommends water bath canning.


I ended up with 7 quarts of thin pie filling.

In jars that were only 1/2 full of cherries.

Soooo, this batch of pie filling is not exactly my idea of a paragon of success.   [I used paragon to describe pie filling again.  How. Cool. Is. That?]

Apparently there is a lot more juice in frozen cherries than there is in fresh blackberries. I figured I'd have to open the jars and monkey with it to get it thicker, but I didn't want to because those cherries had clearly had enough.  Plus, it was hot.   Plus, I just didn't want to monkey with it any more.

Once the jars cooled, they thickened up just enough to be a nice syrup and I realized that sour cherry syrup is a great thing to have.

We served it over chocolate cake and ice cream.   To. Die. For.

Then the next day, I cut up 4 nice big fresh peaches into a greased casserole dish and poured a quart of the cherry syrup-pie-filling-goo over them and topped it with some fruit crisp topping and baked it all until brown and bubbling.

We had that for breakfast.  Because I'm the best mom in the world.  They told me so. 

So, proceeding with a positive attitude and a little creativity, I was able to snatch culinary victory out of the jaws of certain food preservation defeat.    Hah!

My point is, don't despair when your experiments turn out weird.  If they taste good [and this will!] and give you an opportunity to discover something new that you and your family will love.

In the meantime, if you want to actually make regular thick cherry pie filling with Perma Flo this is what I'd do:

Cherry Pie Filling with Perma Flo - the hypothetical version
www.rurification.com

1 gallon frozen cherries
1 quart water
1 rounded cup Perma Flo
6 cups sugar  

Step 1.  Bring the liquid to a boil. If you defrost the cherries completely before you start, then just use that juice and skip the water.

Step 2.  Whisk in the Perma Flo. 

Step 3.  Stir until it starts to thicken.  It takes a few minutes.

Step 4.  Add fruit and sugar and return to boil.

Step 5.  Put in clean jars, wipe rims, top with clean lids and rings.

Step 6.  Process jars for 30 minutes.  The NCHFP recommends water bath canning.

Yield:  5 quarts of cherry pie filling. Ish.

Jammy Oatcakes with Chocolate

Confession:  I kind of got into a groove with these Jammy Oatcakes.   

They're fast.  They're easy. They're fun. They don't involve snow.

Plus, we kept thinking of new combinations. And we had to try every single one of them.  


And they were sooooo good. 

Especially these cherry almond ones.   And then we put some chocolate chips in them and the angels sang and all was right with the world, even with the snow. 


Cherry Almond Chocolate Chip Jammy Oatcakes
www.rurification.com

• 3 cups oatmeal
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup finely chopped almonds
• Handful of dried cherries [optional]
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1/2 cup cherry jam
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup mini chocolate chips

Heat the oven to 350.

Melt the butter, jam, milk and vanilla in the microwave until soft.   I heated it for 1 minute in our microwave and it worked fine.   The butter was soft, but not completely melted.  That's fine.

Mix the oats, flour, salt, cherries and almonds in a mixer while the wet stuff is warming.  Don't add the chocolate chips yet.  Then add the wet stuff and mix it all together thoroughly.

Once everything has been mixed up, make sure it's not too warm.  You don't want to melt the chocolate chips when you're mixing them in the dough.   When the dough is cool enough, mix the chocolate chips in quickly.

Use an ice cream scoop to measure the cakes.   Pack the scoop hard and then pop them out onto a cookie sheet. [You don't have to grease the cookie sheet].   Flatten the cakes a bit with a fork.  Mine were 2 " rounds after I flattened them a bit.

Bake for 15 minutes if you want to eat them hot.  [They hold together better for eating warm and they are fabulous for breakfast!]

Bake for 10 minutes if you want to let them cool and eat them later.  [They'll finish drying as they cool].

Makes 20 cakes, 2" rounds.

Chocolate Raspberry Jam

I saved my favorite for last.

Confession.   Those are frozen raspberries.  Which is why they don't look fresh.  They used to be fresh before they were frozen.    I'm hoping that counts since it's February and fresh raspberries cost as much as a new transmission, which is costly, let me tell you. 

And let me tell you that even though these were frozen raspberries, this jam was so delicious that it was all I could do to pry it away from everyone and not eat the entire contents of the jar for dinner.

It's that good.




Chocolate Raspberry Jam
www.rurification.com

1   12 oz. pkg frozen raspberries.   Or 2 cups.  Whatever.
1 cup water
2 Tablespoons Low Sugar pectin [Use only 1 T to keep it thin enough for ice cream.]
1 cup sugar
chocolate:  1.3 oz chocolate bar or 1/3 cup chocolate chips.  Or as much as you want.   Seriously.  

Cook the raspberries and pectin in the water until the raspberries are soft and broken up.  Feel free to mash them more if you like.   Bring to a hard rolling boil and boil for one minute.   Add sugar and chocolate.  Return to boil.   Boil one minute.    Yield: Just over a pint.

Note:  This was sweet, but it wasn't very sweet.   You might want to add more sugar especially if you're using a dark or less sweet chocolate.   Taste it after you've added the sugar and chocolate and things have melted down.    If it needs to be sweeter add 1/2 cup more sugar.    Then finish.

On ice cream.   A. Mazing.

UPDATE:   I used regular pectin for this jam and it did not gel at all.    You really need a lot of sugar to make regular pectin work.   Keep your eyes open for low sugar pectin and use that whenever you can so that you have a lot of flexibility over how much sugar you use in a recipe.     I recommend 2 T low sugar pectin here because I know that gels when I make raspberry jam.    1 T will give a soft gel.

Want the recipe for this Chocolate Jam and a whole lot of other terrific jam recipes?   Check out my ebook:  A Simple Jar of Jam  at www.rurification.etsy.com.   You can preview the book by clicking the link on the sidebar.  Every purchase helps support this site.  Thank you!

Chocolate Ginger Pear Jam

The whole point of this jam was the chocolate and ginger pairing.    But the ginger needed a vehicle, so it quickly became a chocolate ginger pearing, if you will.  

Sorry.

And since it's February and fresh pears aren't always easy to find and since most folks have canned pears in the cupboard,  and since canned pears are already cored and peeled and cooked into soft deliciousness, I figured I'd make this jam with canned pears.

Indeed.

So, the cute little seckel pears you see in the pic are not what I actually used to make this jam with, but they were a lot more photogenic than the cans of generic pears that I did actually use.

Sorry.

Here's a pic of the crystallized ginger, which you'll agree is photogenic in and of itself.

Indeed.

I love crystallized ginger.   Check my sidebar for a link to a post on how to make this stuff yourself.

Since this jam is mostly about the chocolate and the ginger, feel free to load up on the ginger.   And the chocolate.    You won't be sorry.

Indeed.

Chocolate Ginger Pear Jam
www.rurification.com

2 cans of pears.  The regular size, not the big ones. 
1 tablespoon pectin
1/3 cup sugar [since there was sugar in the syrup that the pears came in, you don't need much.]
1/2 cup minced crystallized ginger
1/3 cup chocolate chips

Drain off most of the pear syrup.  It's OK to leave some in there to cook stuff in.  Dump them in a pan with the pectin and mash them up with a potato masher or a fork or the force of your personality.   Whatever it takes.   Just mash them to the consistency you want.  Chunky is fine.  Puree is fine.   Bring to a hard rolling boil that you can't stir down.   Boil for a minute.   Add the sugar, the ginger and the chocolate.    Bring to a hard rolling boil again and boil for a minute.    Yield:  Just over a pint.

This stuff is really good on ice cream.   Or with a spoon right out of the jar.   Mmmm


Want the recipe for this Chocolate Jam and a whole lot of other terrific jam recipes?   Check out my ebook:  A Simple Jar of Jam  at www.rurification.etsy.com.   You can preview the book by clicking the link on the sidebar.  Every purchase helps support this site.  Thank you!

Chocolate Orange Jam

I've been playing with chocolate jams for a while now.   We love them on ice cream.   Or right out of the jar with a spoon.   We're not picky. 

Over the next few days, I'll give you three versions of this chocolate wonderfulness.   Chocolate raspberry, chocolate ginger pear and chocolate orange.

I made the chocolate orange first because I was making marmalade anyway.   I made a lot of marmalade.   So, I made another little batch of plain marmalade and dropped in a disc of that fabu Organic Stone Ground 70% cacao Extra Dark Chocolate that you see in the pic.   

It was extra dark.

It was stone ground.

It was to die for.

A note about the chocolate.   Don't make a special trip to the store for special chocolate.  Unless you want to.   You can substitute 1/3 cup of chocolate chips.  Or any chocolate bar.  Or cocoa powder as a last resort.  We tried this with all three and much preferred the chips and chocolate bar type chocolates.   The cocoa powder was OK, but not quite as good. 

Also, you should feel free to use more chocolate if you want to.   I mean 'chocolate' is the first word in the name, so you should load up if you want to.    Seriously.

Chocolate Orange Jam
www.rurification.com

4 oranges, zested and sectioned.
1 cup water
3 cups sugar
1.3 oz  disc of chocolate, or 1/3 cup chocolate chips

Zest the oranges and get it boiling in the water while you section the oranges.    Toss in the oranges and sugar and boil down until just before it reaches the gel point for your altitude.   [See Jam page, tab above, for that information]   Grate the chocolate into the jam and stir until it's well combined.    Let it finish cooking until it reaches the gelling point.    Yield:  just over a pint.

Note:   This is a no-pectin recipe.   It's hard to get no-pectin recipes to gel just right.  Don't worry about it.   Err to the side of too thin - it pours over ice cream and waffles better that way.     If it's too thick, then you can't get it out of the jar when it's been in the fridge.  That's a bigger problem than too thin, in my view.

Want the recipe for this Marmalade and a whole lot of other terrific jam recipes?   Check out my ebook:  A Simple Jar of Jam  at www.rurification.etsy.com.   You can preview the book by clicking the link on the sidebar.  Every purchase helps support this site.  Thank you!

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

Our zucchini was kaput this year.    It suffered an early attack by vine borers and it never recovered.   It's still making a valiant effort, but I'm only seeing male flowers.    Kinda pathetic, but I just can't bring myself to pull it up.   I've got a month until frost [fingers crossed] and it might produce some yet.    In the meantime, I'm eating zucchini from the bounty of others.    Thank you all!  

My kids had never had zucchini cake, so I decided to make one, but with chocolate. 

OK, I know you've seen these recipes before and you're probably rolling your eyes - another zucchini cake recipe - blah, blah, blah - but this recipe is remarkably fudgy.

Yes, you read that right.  

Fudgy.   Moist and dark and delicious.   So much so that I'm going to change the name right now to Fudgy Chocolate Zucchini Cake. 

Now that you've seen this fabulous picture, you're going to want to make one yourself with your own zucchini bounty.   I'll try not to be jealous.


Fudgy Chocolate Zucchini Cake 

• 2 cups flour
• 2 cups white sugar
• 3/4 cup cocoa powder
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 4 eggs
• 3/4 cup sour cream, yogurt or buttermilk
• 3/4 cup oil
• 3 cups grated zucchini [1 good sized zucchini]
• 1 cup chopped nuts

Preheat oven 350 degrees.  Grease and flour 9x11 inch pan.   Combine all dry ingredients in a large bowl and mix well - you don't want globs of baking soda in your finished cake, trust me.    Beat eggs.   Add eggs, sour cream and oil.    Mix well.    Fold in nuts and zucchini until well mixed.   Bake for 50-60 minutes.   Don't over bake - you want to keep it moist.  

The kids loved this.   We ate it for breakfast.   With homemade whipped cream. 

I'm thinking it would be so so good with dark chocolate icing.    Or cream cheese icing.   Or just with a sprinkle of powdered sugar.