How To Make Stone Fruits Taste Better: Stone Fruit Jam
I know that it’s not the right season for stone fruits right now, but when it is: Here is a tasty and not to complicated way of turning them into slushy goodness.
I like apricots at least I like the flavor of apricots, but I don’t really enjoy them on their own. By chance I read in my Flavor Bible that apricots are much more delicious if you warm them up a little. I first tried this by throwing them in the oven and sprinkling vanilla sugar on top. However this had only moderate success and I shelved that plan for a while. But when I created the PX Jerez Smash I needed some additional flavor. I thought this is where some apricots might come in handy and so I went shopping for some.
In the supermarket I wasn’t really impressed by the look and smell of the apricots and made the spontaneous decision to buy some vine peaches and nectarines, too. The other ingredients made their way into the recipe, because I wanted to incorporate coffee spices and some sort of alcohol. I like the taste of Arabic coffee spices and not especially in coffee but in other dishes. In my opinion it’s a rather good blend of spices. The part of including alcohol doesn’t really need any explanation, does it? I’m a bartender after all!
Stone Fruit Jam (with Coffee Spices and Orange Curacao)
300 g Apricots
300 g Vine Peaches
300 g Nectarines
500 g Gelling Sugar (2:1)
30 ml Lemon Juice
100 ml Pierre Ferrand Orange Curacao (or a bit more)
7,5 g Coffee Spices (or some healthy dashes)
Purée the fruits with spices. Mix with gelling sugar. Add lemon juice. Bring to boil while constantly stirring. Let simmer for four to five minutes. Add curacao at the end of cooking time and stir vigorously. Wash out jars with boiling water. Fill jam into prepared jars. Turn glasses upside down and let cool to room temperature.
Of course you can enjoy this jam on your pancakes as well and you don’t have to use it just for cocktails. Besides you would have to make a hell of a lot drinks to use up all of the jelly. An additional effect of using jam or marmalade in a cocktail is that it adds a nice texture to the drink. You will observe this when double straining drinks like the PX Jerez Smash after shaking. The pectin of the fruits and jam will jam (no pun intended) your fine strainer so that the rest of the drink will not flow through. Just tap the side of the strainer with the side of your cocktail shaker a few times and the rest of the drink will land in your glass.
