Jam Today, Gone Tomorrow!

The rule is, jam to-morrow and jam yesterday, but never jam today. Or so would Lewis Carroll, in his book Alice in Wonderland, have us believe.
Not so on Bliss though, we are firm believers in jam today!
Black berry (bramble) jam in fact, as there are lots of ripe berries at Bliss at the moment. We have a thorn less black berry which makes for easy and damage free picking ( look Ma no scratches!). And jam making is easy, very easy when you have one of these nifty kitchen gadgets:
a bread making machine. Yep, that's right, this handy gadget is good for making bread; you just chuck in the ingredients and the machine does the rest. The only other thing you have to do, is eating the bread while you enjoy the wonderful smell of freshly baked bread in your home. But, like I said, this handy little machine also makes jam. See? Programme number 13 is for jam making.
So in went the handpicked berries, the sugar and the lemon juice, programme 13 was selected, then the start button was pushed and 125 minutes later the jam was ready. The only thing left to do was pouring the hot jam into squeaky clean glass jars.
Et voila, 3 jars of home made black berry jam today!

I love black berry jam and like having a croissant with it, it is so yummy! And I also like to put a spoonful or two in some yogurt, or on some piping hot pancakes, mmmmm delicious! And of course, having made the jam by the sweat of your brow, slaving over a hot stove (not!) makes it taste even more delicious.

And there are more ripe berries at Bliss than just the black berries; loads of elder berries, ready for picking.
But not today, they will have to wait because we're going away on holiday, to Denmark and maybe also Sweden this time. So cheerio, and I'll be back before you know it!

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Sam (left) with his daughter Pippa

A heartfelt thank you to all my garden blogger friends world wide for all their kind words, e-cards and support. I miss my Sam more than I can say but all the hugs, love, understanding and sympathy you have showered on me, does help, so thank you all!
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Gardening, like living, should be fun. It can't be much of the time, but we can do our best to make it so. It is that intangible something which immediately proclaims that behind the scenes there is an original whose guiding hand has created something ephemeral, yes, but with the magic of a sunset.
Christopher Lloyd