Last year, I wanted to make vanilla extract for holiday gifts, but I missed out. I have heard people say, variously, that it takes two months, three months, six months — in…

Of all the seedlings I started last January, my ground cherries fared best. (Ground cherries are also called “husk cherries,” or sometimes “cape gooseberries.”) They proved hardy from the start, weathering all…

This one’s a darkly elegant jam, with a touch of black raspberry liqueur and some of the seeds removed to make it smoother than it would otherwise be.

I’m sitting on the floor in the San Francisco airport, waiting for a flight that’s been delayed three hours. One of the only good things about hanging around the airport all afternoon…

There are a bazillion and a half ways to make fruit leather. You can use one fruit or a mix of many. You can add sugar or not. You can add spices…

A week or so ago, I was bemoaning my lack of plums. I used to rent a house with the most gloriously productive Santa Rosa plum tree you could imagine. During my…

I felt subdued about entering my preserves in this year’s county fair. I’ll confess, my confidence was low. It may be because I did well last year — my first year —…

Is there really such a thing as “sugar-free” jam? With all the sugar in the fruit itself, it’s technically impossible. But you can make jam without refined sugar. All you need is…

For the past few days, I’ve been experimenting with recipes for jams that don’t contain refined sugar — just crushed fruit, sweetened with concentrated fruit juice and jelled with Pomona’s Pectin. On…