To point out the obvious, food trends come and go. Traditional food that have been around for decades, or even centuries, can come to the forefront of attention given enough traction in the media. Last year, I learned of rumtopf first from canning/preserving bloggers, then from food writers in mainstream publications. The idea of preserving fruit in sugar and rum over the course of growing season was nothing more than a curiosity the first time I read it. However, as I followed regular updates of other bloggers’ rumtopf and reading about it in New York Times, my desire to tackle this project grew.
Unfortunately, rumtopf does require a bit of planning and commitment. I missed out on the opportunity last year. By the time my interest swelled to such a level that I was ready to buy the requisite large preserving jars, the growing season was more than halfway over. I already missed out on most of the berries and stone fruit! I filed the recipes away in the back of my mind and my attention turned to jams, jellies, and marmalades.
Last week, I rummaged around my bookmarks for strawberry jam recipes using no added pectin. When that search came up short, I visited a few of my favourite canning/preserving blogs for inspirations. Lo and behold, rumtopf showed up somewhere in the search result. I am glad to be reminded of this project! Although I’m late to the rumtopf blogging party by a whole year, I am starting my own batch nonetheless. Pffft to trends!
Fresh Ontario strawberry is the harbinger of summer and kicks off a busy preserving time for me. Some are destined for jams of course but I reserve the most perfect specimens for rumtopf. They were first macerated (i.e. plumped) with 50% weight of sugar overnight in the fridge. The next day, I divided them among four 1.9L mason jars. Two were filled with dark rum and two with vodka. Rum is the traditional choice of spirits but I think neutral tasting colourless vodka would best showcase the colour and taste of the fruit. I intentionally went for smaller jars to hedge my bets so to speak. In case any spoilage should happen between now and Christmas, at least the damage would be contained within 25% of my effort. Besides, having four jars at the ready means I may have three incredible Christmas presents taken care of!
06/23/2011
- 1089g strawberries
- 544.5g sugar
- no measurement taken for Meyer’s dark rum or Absolut vodka
06/30/2011
- 1040g raspberries
- 520g sugar
07/22/2011
- 700g bing cherries, unpitted
- 350g sugar
- topped with more dark rum and vodka
08/11/2011
- 440g blueberries
- 220g sugar
- topped with more dark rum and vodka
08/12/2011
- 500g apricots, pitted and halved
- 250g sugar
08/27/2011
- 588g golden velvet plumcots, pitted and cut to wedges
- 294g sugar
- topped with more dark rum and vodka
