Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with jam

Translate the Razzleberry Jam?

slowcat — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 22:05:08 -0800

Can someone translate the Japanese in this song for me: The Razzleberry Jam, the theme song of the Razzleberry frozen yogurt franchise in Tokyo. If you don't already have it, you can download it here: http://razzleberry.jp/ Under Special Download near the bottom. Thanks!

The home-made jam expiration date mystery

Baud — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 05:45:57 -0800

I could sell some very small-scale home-made jam. How can I know what will be the expiration date be ? Since I discovered that jam is not exactly the most complicated recipe out there (one part fruit, one part sugar) I started doing some for my own usage.

Through a sell-your-garden-stuff website about to open I could sell some of my production to people in my area.

It looks like the jams sold in supermarket have an expiration date set two years after they are manufactured.

How can I know what in the cooking process will decide when the expiration date of my home-made jame will be ?

Right now I'm applying boiling water to the pots before putting the jam in it. I suspect there may be more radical way of ensuring an expiration as far away as possible.

standard disclaimer : english is not my mother tongue.

Half preserved

Blazecock Pileon — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 01:43:49 -0800

I made a half-full jar of jam, is it safe to eat? Never thought I'd ever ask a "is it safe to eat" question, but here I am.

I made some strawberry jam for the first time and I was only able to fill the last jar halfway full. The other jars were filled to 1/4" from the lip.

I gave it the same boiling and cooling time as the full jars. Due to the air pocket acting as a floatation device, I had to use a meat tenderizer as a weight to hold down the jar as it was boiled.

The jar lid dimple is depressed, so it looks like a good seal was made. There's some condensation inside the jar's sides, where the jam doesn't cover.

Will it be safe to consume, or should I toss it?

Also, the mashed berries seemed to separate during cooling. There's about 1" of jelly at the bottom of each jar and mashed fruit bits at the top — is that normal, in general?

What shall I eat for lunch?

Tapioca — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 06:52:05 -0800

What else can I keep at my desk for making sandwiches? I'm bored of peanut butter and jam. I keep PB and jam at my desk in the office. That way, I can just grab some bread on leaving the house in the morning, and make a sandwich at my desk when I get hungry at lunchtime.

PB and jam are nice, but I tire of them. What other sandwich fillings can I keep *at my desk* without refrigeration. Sweet and savoury both good. I'm vegetarian, but I doubt that's relevant here (meat not being shelf stable, and all that).

I need no-sugar freezer jam!

FunkyHelix — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 06:55:51 -0800

Anyone know a good no sugar/Splenda recipe for strawberry freezer jam? I bought Sure-Jell No Sugar/Less Sugar Fruit Pectin to make strawberry freezer jam thinking that I could make the jam with no sugar. But according to the directions and the customer service agent I called, you can only make no sugar/low sugar cooked jam. Freezer jam still takes 3 whole cups of sugar or it won't set right. Only one less cup than full sugar freezer jam.

My mom is a diabetic and we keep my son on a low sugar diet because it's healthier. Three cups of sugar is still way too much sugar for them. And I don't want to make cooked jam because it requires canning skills, jars, canner to boil jars in, etc. It's a pain in the ass.

Is there a way to make no sugar/splenda freezer jam?

How to meet other not-old-but-not-so-young-either musicians?

El Curioso — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 16:58:34 -0800

Where do gainfully employed, moderately settled, experienced mid-30s musicians connect to play together casually and on occasion rawk out? How can an experienced 35-year-old musician (guitar, learning drums) relatively new to a musically inclined town (Portland OR, 1 year) meet other decent players?

My stylistic interests are wide--rock, funk, soul, even electronica or something jazzy or hiphoppish--but I can't seem to meet other musicians like I used to.

I'm not interested in anything too intense off the bat, just having fun & jamming, maybe eventually writing some songs and/or gigging.

Ten years ago I would have just put an ad in the paper. Now I don't get out quite as much, and hanging in a smoky club trying to strike up a conversation isn't really my thing.

There's Craigslist and the normal classifieds, I know, although everybody seems to be looking for a solid 22-year-old drummer with MySpace clips to complete a band and go on tour. Not many of my friends are that musical. I've got a list of a few blues-jam nights I'm planning on swinging by.

What other avenues are there?

Music Non-Stop

quelindo — Sat, 26 Apr 2008 22:10:59 -0800

I heard this great soul/funk song that was slightly psychedelic on Baltimore radio the other day. All I can remember is that the song featured lyrics about coming home at 5 A.M. I must track down this jam. The DJ kept talking about the Persuasions before the song, but after listening to that band I've realized the DJ was borderline full of shit. So what've you got? Are you man/woman/genderless enough to answer the question?

Who keeps clogging the toilet, and why?

dubold — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 12:57:59 -0800

[ToiletMysteryFilter]Why would someone clog a public toilet with paper every day? I work in an older building in NYC. The offices do not have individual bathrooms; there is a restroom for each gender, and each office has keys.

After I arrive at work, I go to use the facilities. For the last several months, every day, sometime between 9:30 and 10:00, the left-most stall has a great deal of toilet paper in the bowl. It is usually in a distinctive layout - it looks like it was being used to prevent contact with the seat, as well as wadded up and tossed in the bowl. I am estimating 1/5th to 1/3 of a roll is used per visit. It also looks as if there is urine in the bowl. If there is feces in the bowl, it is completely covered and not visible. Attempts to flush the toilet usually result in blockage and overflow.

I suspect it is the same person every time for two reasons. One: it's the same approx quantity and dispersal of paper every time. Two: It's about the same time every day. If I'm there before 9:30 or so, the toilet is empty. Between 9:30 and 10:00 it is plugged.

So why do I care? It's mildly inconvenient for me - only one other stall and the urinal is usable - but I would imagine terribly frustrating for the cleaning staff. For a couple weeks a plunger was left in the restroom, but that's disappeared.

I had thought about just leaving a note - something along the lines of "Hi, please stop putting so much toilet paper in the bowl".

The only thing that prevented me from leaving a note right away: there are a lot of different folks from various countries in the building. From previous Metafilter threads, I have ascertained that not everyone has the same toilet practices - is there some cultural/regional thing that I should be aware of here?

A couple years ago, we were finding water all over the floor of the bathroom, and it turned out that a couple men in the building were observant Muslims who used the sinks to wash before prayer. Obviously this is a slightly different condition, but if there's some cultural practice at work, I'll just bite my tongue and deal with it.

Before this started, I was talking to another tenant in the building, and he told me that someone was clogging a toilet on his floor daily. He described a similar condition. About 2 months later, it started on this floor.

Anyone have any clue as to what's going on here?

FruitFilter

deborah — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 13:42:08 -0800

I have two fruit trees that seem to be ripening ...NOW. One is an apple tree and the other tree is a plum. I already know about making jam (which is what I'll probably do with the plums) and making apple butter/sauce. I have a few questions: - What should I do with the fruit that isn't usable (bugs, birds, too ripe, etc.)? I have a compost bin. I doubt I can just chuck the whole fruit in there. I should at least pit the plums, right? Cut the fruit up into smaller bits? Any other disposal tips would be great.

- Can I clean and semi-process the fruit (skin, pit, slice up, etc.) and freeze the slices for later jamming and saucing? If I can do this, should I use heavy-duty freezer bags? Space is not a problem; I have a large deep freeze.

- Do y'all have any other ideas/recipes for plums and apples? Please share!

Please note: I'm not totally ignorant about canning, but it's been about 25 years since I canned anything except pickles.

In a jam about what recipe to use!

spotty_dog — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 07:58:48 -0800

Does anyone have any good recipies for making strawberry jam? I am 35 weeks pregnant, and all i can think about today is jam. I am a good cook, if i have a recipe to follow, so am wanting to know if anyone had a good recipe for making strawberry jam.

It has to be a something which will taste delicous on crispy french stick and proper butter....

Making/canning preserves

veggieboy — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 06:53:57 -0800

I'm making raspberry preserves. I want to use half-pint jars instead of the pint jars the recipe specifies. However, I'm a little paranoid. I'm an experienced home cook, so I frequently modify/ignore recipes. But it's different when I'm doing home-canning. I scrupulously follow the recipe because there are food safety issues at play.

This is the second summer now that I've done a lot of canning/preserving, using the Ball Blue Book of Preserving. One of the frustrating things is that, for example, on Page 32, it gives a recipe for berry jam and says it makes "3 pints." My question: I can use half-pint jars and process them for the same amount of time, right? Because a full pint of raspberry preserves is rather a lot.

I cannot see how harm would come from using a smaller jar and processing it for the same time as you would process the larger jar (setting aside possible taste issues and focusing only on safety). But I would be comforted to hear from others on their experience here.

Internet jam session?

Infernarl — Sun, 29 Jul 2007 03:17:01 -0800

Low latency, medium fidelity, jam sessions on the internet. NINJAM is too buggy :( I want to "jam" live with people on the other side of the world over the internet. What is the simplest, best, solution for sending audio of an acceptable fidelity for recording across the internet? I want a piece of software that does one thing and one thing well. PC, Mac, and Linux compatibility would be a big plus but I am mostly concerned about OS X. NINJAM is great for fidelity and K.i.S.S. but I've had many sessions ruined by its buggyness, or being kicked from the server and it hasn't been update since 2005. what is the state of the art?

Liquid vs Powdered Pectin?

onhazier — Mon, 12 Jun 2006 04:20:14 -0800

Does liquid pectin cause jam to set more slowly? For the last three weeks, I have been making strawberry jam. The first week results were perfect. It was a double batch in which my measurements were not 100%. The second batch, made a week ago, still has not set. My ratio of fruit to sugar to pectin was off. Yesterday's batch also did not set. I made sure I followed the recipe exactly. Batch one was made with powdered pectin. Batches two and three were made with liquid pectin.

This is my second year making jam. The only time my previous jams did not set right away was when I made an apricot/red plum jam and only used one box of pectin for what was essentially a double batch of jam. I had read that plums have a high pectin content and that apricots take forever to set. It did eventually set though it took about 2 months.

So, does liquid pectin take longer to work? When making jam, which version gave you better results?

Drum circle strategies?

bricoleur — Tue, 08 Mar 2005 14:07:59 -0800

This Friday, my daughter and I are hosting a drum circle. This will be the first one in our small Midwestern town (that I know of, anyway). We are both still very much beginners; we know some rhythms, but aren't adept soloists. (So we're not really qualified, but we're not letting that stop us.) Please share your favorite strategies for a fun drum circle that gets everyone in the groove.

Chocolate Linzer Cookies

Miko — Thu, 16 Dec 2004 17:24:32 -0800

Got a good recipe for chocolate linzer cookies? Specs inside. I've made these cookies many times in past years by adapting the Joy of Cooking's Drei Augen recipe. The problem is, that recipe poses problems -- it produces a too-fragile cookie that browns unevenly. After an unproductive Google recipe search, I decided to ask people who might know. 20,000 users can't be wrong.

So what I'm after --

1. A recipe which uses real almonds in the dough, not extract.
2. A recipe which specifies both raspberry jam and chocolate layers -- not because I can't just add them to any recipe, but I'm hoping to find a tried-and-true recipe where the cookies are strong enough to hold up to the fillings.
3.A recipe that you, or another reliable authority, have had real-life experience with. Those recipe-farm web sites always make you wonder if anyone's ever actually made the food.

Pentax 35mm with jammed shutter release. Worth saving?

mwhybark — Tue, 27 Jul 2004 18:01:05 -0800

Pentax K1000, with a jammed shutter release button. I hardly ever use film any more, but have a soft spot for the 35mm format and this camera in particular. It's been jammed for at least ten years. Repair, replace, or junk and move on?