Seasonal Delights ‘Grandma’s Apricot Jam’

The season of the stone fruits has arrived to Cyprus and plums, peaches and nectarines can be found in abundance in all local supermarkets and ‘frouterias’.  They are juicy, sweet and very fresh. They are unloaded in high stacks from open back trucks in colourful crates. A sight that every Cypriot is comfortably familiar with; summer has arrived!

My favorite stone fruits are apricots. They are very tasty on their own, but also prefect for baking delicious cakes (see last years blog) and make great jam. I recently took on the challenge of making my own apricot jam, depsite the fact I am a complete jam making novice. The recipe was a Cypriot classic and very easy, so not much could go wrong…

And it didn’t go wrong… How do I know? Marcos’ comment when he tasted it: ‘Mmmmm….it is good. It reminds me of my grandmother’s apricot jam’. That says it all ????

The jam is now served at the winery with our ‘Vineyard & Breakfast Experience‘.

Ingredients

1 Kg Apricots
550 Grams of granulated sugar
2 Lemons (Make sure they are juicy lemons)
3 Bay leafs

Method

Halve the apricots, take out the stones and discard them. Place the halved apricot in a big heavy-bottomed pan. Add the sugar, the juice of the two lemons and bay leafs. Give it a good stir and leave it for a couple of hours to soak. The sugar will absord the juices and get thicker.

After 2 hours, remove the bay leafs. Heat up the pan to a low heat and let the sugar dissolve.  Once dissolved, turn the heat a bit higher and cook the jam. Cook until the apricot flesh has broken down in pieces and has cooked down. The jam should have a lovely golden orange colour and have a medium set consistency.

When the jam is ready, leave it to cool down for about 15 minutes. Then spoon the jam into sterilised jars. Close and seal the jars while the jam is still warm. Let the jars cool down completely.

You can keep the jars outside of the fridge, but after opening they need to be stored in the fridge.

Enjoy!