Rhubarb and Ginger Jam

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Wide, heavy preserving pan or large saucepan
• •Wooden spoon
• •Four medium jam jars with lids
• •Ladle or jam funnel
• •Small plate (for the freezer set test)

Instructions

1. 1

   Macerate the rhubarb

   Tip the rhubarb into a wide, heavy preserving pan or your largest saucepan. Add the sugar, the lemon juice, the chopped stem ginger and its syrup, and the grated fresh ginger. Stir it all through with a wooden spoon. The sugar will look stubborn at first. Don't worry about it. Cover the pan with a clean cloth and leave it on the side overnight, or for at least six hours. By morning, the sugar will have drawn the juice out of the rhubarb and you'll have a pink, glossy slurry sitting under a layer of softened fruit. This is the start of everything.

   Forced rhubarb is what you want here. The slim, coral-pink kind that comes out of Yorkshire sheds in late winter. It tastes brighter and sharper than the green-tinged outdoor stuff and gives the jam its proper colour.
2. 2

   Sterilise the jars

   Wash four medium jam jars and their lids in hot soapy water and rinse them well. Set them upside down on a baking tray and put them in a low oven, around 120C, for fifteen minutes until completely dry. Leave them in the warm oven until you need them. Cold jars and hot jam don't get on. The lids can go in a small pan of just-boiled water for a few minutes.

3. 3

   Bring to the boil

   Put a small plate in the freezer. You'll need it later. Set the pan of macerated rhubarb over a low heat and stir gently until any remaining sugar has dissolved completely. Drag the spoon across the bottom of the pan. If you can feel any grit, keep stirring. Once it's smooth, drop in the split vanilla pod if you're using one, then turn the heat up and bring the jam to a rolling boil. Properly rolling. The kind that won't stir down.

4. 4

   Boil for the set

   Let it boil hard for eight to ten minutes, stirring now and then so nothing catches on the base. The colour will deepen from pale pink to a darker, jewel-toned coral, and the smell will turn from raw rhubarb into something warmer, with the ginger coming forward. Skim off any pink foam that gathers at the edges with a spoon. It's harmless, but the finished jam looks better without it.

   Trust your nose. When the kitchen stops smelling of cooking fruit and starts smelling of jam, you're close. There's a definite shift. You'll know it when it happens.
5. 5

   Test the set

   Take the pan off the heat. Spoon a little jam onto the cold plate from the freezer and put it back in the freezer for a minute. Push it with your fingertip. If the surface wrinkles and the jam holds its shape rather than running back together, it's ready. If it's still loose, put the pan back on the heat for another two or three minutes and try again. A jam that hasn't reached set will be lovely on yoghurt but won't hold its shape on toast. Better to test twice than to be sorry.

6. 6

   Jar and seal

   Let the jam sit in the pan for five minutes off the heat. This stops the fruit from sinking to the bottom of the jars. Fish out the vanilla pod if you used one. Ladle the jam into the warm jars, right up to within a centimetre of the rim, and seal the lids on tightly while everything is still hot. You should hear the lids pop down as they cool. That's the seal forming. Label them with the date once they're cold.

Chef Tips

• •Forced rhubarb is the whole point of making this jam in February. The colour is the colour you want, that proper pink rather than the murky red-brown you get from later outdoor rhubarb. If you can only find the green-stemmed sort, save the recipe for next winter. The market decides.
• •Don't be tempted to skip the overnight maceration. Letting the sugar pull the juice out of the rhubarb means you start cooking with liquid already in the pan, which protects the colour and keeps the fruit from breaking down into mush before the jam reaches its set. It's the difference between a jam that looks like jam and one that looks like sad pink porridge.
• •Jam sugar with added pectin is your friend here. Rhubarb is naturally low in pectin, and without help the jam will never properly set. You can do it with regular sugar and extra lemon if you're stubborn, but I've stopped being stubborn about this one. Some battles aren't worth fighting at eight in the morning.
• •A jar of this tied with string and a brown paper label is one of the better things to give someone in early spring. People remember a homemade jam in a way they don't remember most presents. There are few better feelings than handing over a jar of something you made on a wet Saturday.

Advance Preparation

• •The rhubarb must macerate with the sugar for at least six hours, ideally overnight. Plan accordingly. This is the kind of recipe you start the night before and finish the next morning over a cup of tea.
• •Sealed properly, the jam keeps in a cool, dark cupboard for up to a year, though it never lasts that long in my house. Once a jar is opened, refrigerate it and use within a month.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 20g)