Increasing the Strategic Jam Reserve

Last year, I did most of my preserving in the spring, putting up what I thought would be a sufficient amount of preserved foods to keep us going through the next 12 months or so.  This is always a guessing game, as my family tends to go on food jags -- where they'll want a particular item every day for a couple of months, for example -- but it will be followed by a period when no one touches the stuff for a year or more.  Totally unpredictable, and often frustrating.  


Sometime around last Christmas, for instance, we ran out of strawberry preserves (due to a teenager-induced drain on our Strategic Strawberry Jam Reserves) and I decided not to buy more at the store, waiting instead for spring, when strawberries would be back in season and I could make some more jam at home.  It's been a long wait, and I don't think anyone has missed strawberry jam more than me.  I have plenty of marmalade (and ironically, I was stocked up on it because this was the item I ran out of in early 2011), but it doesn't take the place of strawberry jam.  I love my marmalade, but frankly am a little burned out on it at this point.

So you can imagine how thankful I've been to finally see the farmers' strawberry stands opening up once again, with their red, ripe strawberries available locally, and in abundance.  This morning I put up about seven jars of strawberry preserves, and plan on doing at least another seven jars -- maybe more.  I'm happy I was able to wait for this fruit to come into season, because store-bought jam pales in comparison to homemade.  And waiting for it seems to reinforce the idea that to everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven -- including the time to preserve, and eat, delicious strawberry jam.  Turn, turn, turn.