Konfitura, Baby!

I have made konfitura. Myself. From berry bush to jar, all from scratch.
I’m expecting a call from the President at any moment.

This is not a very elegantly presented or photographed dish, but homemade waffles with homemade blackberry preserves is the best.

Konfitura can be translated simply as jam or as I prefer, preserves. My original plan was to make jeżynówka or nalweka from jeżyny. Nalewka is homemade liquor. If you’ve ever had it, especially berry or cherry liquor, I’m sure you’d agree that it is delicious. It’s so deceptively delicious that I have seen people who don’t usually drink, quickly get falling-down drunk. OK, that was me, but I am sure it has happened to other people as well. I checked the nalewka recipes and saw that I’d have to wait a month or 2 or 3 to consume said nalewka. There is also a process of filtering that looks like a lot of work for a person who rarely drinks alcohol. So it seems that delicious nalewka is reserved for the patient which I am definitely not. (Notice the unhealthy pale color of my waffle. Waiting for it to brown up was just taking too long and I had already started to eat all the preserves straight from the jar.) In the end, I opted for a recipe which allows me to eat berries now.

We pick blackberries in a secret and undisclosed location near our house in the village. Judging by the quantity and quality of berries we’ve been picking the last few weeks and the unscientific research I have done (i.e. ask the drunks at the shop), we are the only people who pick berries. Apparently picking berries is for biedaki and/or hipsters. At any given time, I fall into either or both of those categories, so I guess that evaluation is spot on.

Here is how this poor hipster made some delicious jam.

Blackberry jam – Konfitura z jeżyn

We picked about a kilogram of ripe berries. We ate another half a kilo on the walk. We spotted an eagle catching a fish and then a frog jumped into my berry container. Don’t worry, I didn’t preserve it. At home, I cleaned the berries and removed all extra material such as leaves, a snail, a worm of some kind and the frog. Next, I started cooking the kilo of berries in a big pot. I added a teaspoon of citric acid to keep the color vibrant. Next, I added the seeds of one vanilla bean. Finally, I added cukier żelujący – gelling sugar and cooked for 3-5 minutes. After that I transferred the hot berries to clean jars, put the lid on, and let stand upside down for 5-10 minutes. I then checked that the jar top sealed and that’s it.

That’s all there is to it. Easy, isn’t it? We also found some big, fat mushrooms I thought would be perfect for pickling. I know nothing about wild mushrooms so when Misiu declared, “I think you can eat them.” I decided that pickled mushrooms can wait for another day.

Smacznego!