The Undomestic Goddess

The big tree in our backyard was loaded with beautiful yellow orange fruit, come in cluster and tastes nice and tarty like apricot. After a few trial and errors and no one got poisoned, we found out it was loquat. According to our research, firm, slightly immature fruits are best for making pies or tarts. The fruits are also commonly used to make jam, jelly and chutney, and are delicious poached in light syrup. Loquats can also be used to make wine.

Wazza thought that we should make jam and I felt compelled in doing it, because they just got rotten in the tree otherwise. But let me make it clear from the start, I never thought it was a good idea. And it turned out to be the most ambitious project I have the whole year. Obviously, my kitchen brain is not as big as my kitchen bravery. And believe me, I haven't got any satisfaction in doing it.

Right. So, first of all, we need to find out how to make a jam. Hmm.. mr. google makes it sound easy, just boil the fruit til it's very soft, add some sugar and the pectin -hang on, what? With a little assistance from mr google (how did we survive without internet?), we revealed that we can purchase the thing (it's a thickening agent actually, for the jam) at the groceries stores. Piece of cake. I couldn't find any jam jar anywhere but it's not a biggie either, I could always use old jars in the pantry, only need to sterilise it before putting the jam in (this part sounded a bit tricky as a matter of fact).

You would not believe how much sugar is needed for a jar of jam! I bought a package of 1 kg sugar, thinking that this would be plenty.But the recipe said 2.5 kilograms!! Eeeek.. My creative mind decided to portion down the recipe - this and the fact that pitting 1.5 kg of loquat (according to the recipe) took forever.

3 hours of boiling the fruit later, they are still not soft and Oliver and I had to go to our gymbaroo session. Oh well, the jam can wait...

As soon as we got back from gymbaroo, I picked it up where I left off . But during the period where the recipe said : "bring to boil vigorously and stir occasionally for 5-10 minutes" Oliver woke up and screamed on the top of his lungs! so there you go, no stirring occasionally.

The jam turned out to have too thick consistency, taste too sugary (and I only used half of the sugar!) and... smells like chicken stock (Mppph... this is because I used the jar that I previously used for chicken stock).

Now update on the boy. He's turning into little rebel - and not even a teenager yet! changing nappy is fighting session now, so is bedtime. Rianti said there are times where you need to wave the white flag and admit defeated, but in my opinion, there are times that you need to be 'stepmother' and these are the times. Doesn't really work though, he still gets his way most of the time.

helping mama with the laundry? I don't think so.