Where is the Fig Jam, Honey? A New Batch was Required - Fig & Date Preserve

It started when I asked "Where are the jars of Fig Jam, honey?" He said "well, I have a little every day just as a sweet treat " so I stopped looking for them and started looking for fresh figs at the stores around my home. HA!! It was a long weekend and they were all gone. Except for a half tray hubby sheepishly handed me from a store he remembered to stop into to while on an errand.

I love dates so I always have a bag of dried pitted dates in the cupboard, they are wonderful cooked down and added to loaves of bread and muffins. Let us not forget the heavenly dream that is sticky toffee pudding. I also always keep some pitted prunes at all times because I love eating them instead of candy, with the added benefit they give to other areas of the body.

So the plan became to use them all in a preserve. I don't like nuts in jams, so not a compote. The Food In Jars Challenge is certainly pushing my Jammin' adventures to new levels.

I added the dates first with some water and cooked them down slowly till they were mushy. Then I added the figs and the prunes. I also added lemon and orange juice, 2/3 cup sugar, and started cooking it all down. I added a whole cinnamon stick and cooked it with the jam. Remove the cinnamon when the jam is finished. I left it chunky because I want to use it on top of Brie later on. I processed it 20 minutes in a water bath.

Ingredients:

3 1/4 cup fresh figs - cleaned and quartered
1 1/2 cup dates - no pits
1/4 cup prunes - no pits
2/3 cup sugar
Juice of one lemon
1 teaspoon orange zest
juice of 1/2 an orange
1 cinnamon stick

Method:

I described above the steps I take. This jam is of my own making. It follows the formula for a preserve but I will most likely freeze this even though I water bathed it and followed all cleanliness and canning rules for safety. I will keep a few jars in the fridge for a week or two.

Side note: I had some this morning on my soft cheese toast, it was thick but lovely spreadable consistency. I am really pleased.

~ Hugs from Mum

#fijchallenge #figjam #dateswithfigspreserve