Jess found strawberries for six bucks a flat the other day, and brought home four flats. Yes, they’re from a factory farm somewhere in the western hemisphere; yes, they were probably genetically designed to withstand nuclear bombs while still retaining a remote taste of strawberries. But our strawberry bed is not up to this level of production yet, and I have a weakness for strawberry jam–especially on hot biscuits on a snowy winter night. And you can’t beat the price.

So here’s the raw material.

Abby cut off the tops of every berry–we mixed in our harvest from the yard–and spent around three hours doing it. Go Abby!

Becca stirring the mush. (I’m not sure why it’s on the stove; they were making freezer jam.) Right next to the pan you see some of our pea harvest. (I’m not sure why it’s soaking; we froze our peas.)

The finished product. Our final count (we did a little more jam the next day) was 48 pints of fresh homemade strawberry jam.

And the season’s just getting started. Next up: string beans from the garden.