Making peach jam and eggplant preserve.

Jars

Books which tell you how to preserve anything.

Eggplants cut into little

Eggplants and vinegar on the stove cooking.

Drying before canning.

All the ingredients.

The end result in the peach jam process.

It was a rainy day, and I took it as an excuse to make peach jam and eggplant preserve. I have been meaning for a while to make jams, but I have never really found the time to do it.

For the recipe I used an old book, in which you can find instruction on how to preserve just about anything.

For the peach jam:

1 Kg of ripe peaches

750 g of sugar

The peaches were peeled and cut into small cube. The peaches and the sugar were mixed and left overnight. In the morning the mixture was boiled for about 1.5h until it passed the teaspoon test*. While the peaches were cooking the glass jars were heated at 100 oC in the oven. In tow of the jars I placed some cinnamon sticks. The jam was placed while still hot in the hot jars. the jars were sealed and turned upside down to cool.

* a bit of the hot jam is placed on a plate. The plate is tilted, if the jam does not run down the plate then it is ready.

For the eggplants (recipe for 3Kg of eggplants, I only made 1.5Kg)

1 L of white wine vinegar

1 tablespoon of salt

1 tablespoon of sugar

Cloves

Basil leaves

Rosemary

Garlic

The eggplants were peeled and cut into small cubes. They were salted and left to stand to drain some of the water out of them. They were rinsed and dried. The vinegar, salt and sugar were brought to a boil. The eggplants were cooked in the vinegar for about 3 minutes, after which they were placed on a towel and left to cool.

A layer of eggplant was placed at the bottom of a jar followed by some garlic, a few cloves, a few basil leaves, and some rosemary. Some of the vinegar was poured on top. The layers were repeated until the jar was full. At the end the jar was toped with some extra virgin olive oil.

Now all I have to do is wait at least 15 days before eating!