The first homemade jam I ever tasted was made with homegrown plums. I was just four or five years old and the trees in our backyard were having a bumper year. My mom picked enough to fill her yellow enamel colander, gave them a good rinse under the tap, and turned them in sweet, slightly drippy preserves. We ate those plums over pancakes and with oatmeal every chance we got.
Though I will often tell people that blueberries are my foundational fruit (and they were the star in my very first solo batch of jam), there is something about the flavor of plum jam that makes my brain go, “ah yes, THIS is what homemade jam should taste like.”
I recently made my first batch of plum jam for this season (I was asked by Anolon gourmet cookware to develop this particular recipe), from the same kind of sturdy black plums that used to grow in our southern California yard. I added a little ground cardamom for extra depth and I cooked the whole thing in the 7.5 quart wide stock pot from the Anolon Advanced line. Though I don’t normally gravitate towards non-stick cookware for jam making, the width and low walls of the pan made it irresistible.
Disclosure: This is a sponsored post (hopefully that was clear before you got to this disclosure statement). Anolon has compensated me for the creation of the plum jam recipe. They sent me the stockpot in which I made the jam (I did really like it, though), and they’re providing the cookware set for the giveaway. The thoughts and words are still all entire mine.
Plum Cardamom Jam
Ingredients
- 5 pounds plums
- 4 cups granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon ground cardamom
- 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
Instructions
- Wash plums well and cut them in half to remove pits. Slice the plums into thin half moons and heap them into a low, wide pan.
- Add the sugar and stir to combine. Cover the pan and let the plums macerate for at least an hour.
- When the plums are quite juicy and most of the sugar has dissolved, remove the cover from the pan and place it on the stove.
- Add the cardamom and lemon juice and bring the fruit to a boil.
- Cook the fruit at a controlled boil, stirring regularly, for 30 to 40 minutes, until the plums soften and the syrup thickens. You’ll know when the jam is done because it will become more resistant to stirring, and when you pull the spoon out of the pan, the droplets will be thick and slow moving.
- While the plums cook, prepare a boiling water bath canner and 8 half pint jars.
- When the jam is done, remove the pan from the heat. Funnel it into the prepared jars.
- Wipe the rims, apply the heated lids and clean rings, and process the closed jars in a boiling water bath canner for 10 minutes (do not start your timer until the pot returns to a full, rolling boil).
- Once the time is up, remove the jars from the canner and set them on a folded kitchen towel to cool. The lids should seal promptly and will often make a pinging or popping sound as the vacuum forms. When the jars are sealed, the center of the lids will be concave and when pressed, the lid will not move or wiggle.
My favorite cookware right now is my stainless braiser/skillet! One meal pan is what it is.
I don’t know if this counts but I have recently fallen in love with my mezzaluna knife! I use it to not only mince garlic and herbs, but we use it instead of a pizza cutter! I can’t wait to find more uses for it. But if that doesn’t count
I guess the piece of cookware we use the most in our house is a aluminum caldero I bought while I was living in the Dominican Republic. It is light, performs as well as a dutch oven and is perfect for making rice with crunchy bits on the bottom. I hope to get a bigger one next time I go down with my husband to visit his family.
My stainless steel skillet is definitely the thing I love and use most in my kitchen. It makes everything – eggs, pancakes, curries, sauces, sauteed veggies.
My All-Clad 12″ saute pan (with the 2nd handle on the opposite side) is my go-to for everything. I wouldn’t be able to cook without it.
High-walled skillet definitely gets the most use.
These days it is mostly our enameled green cast iron Dutch oven. But I run into trouble when I want to make one thing at a time.
I am really enjoying my ceramic coated pans.
My Ikea 6-quart pot! It’s scorched on the sides and a little burned on the bottom, and I use it for just about everything.
(I’ve already entered with another comment, so don’t count this as an entry)
The links for the Anolon Advanced 11-Piece Cookware Set, Anolon twitter, and Anolon facebook don’t seem to be working.
I use my 10″ cast iron frying pan for everything! I love it! Next in line is my cast iron Dutch oven. I love that I can use them on the stovetop and in the oven. They clean easily because they are so seasoned they’re practically non- stick!
Favorite piece has to be my enamel coated cast iron 7qt. pot! Perfect for everything!
Hands down, it’s my dutch oven. i use it almost every day. what an amazing contest — thank you!
My 4.5q Le Creuset dutch oven – it looks great and I can make almost anything in it!
Just a big aluminum skillet that heats fast and is super nonstick. I use it every day for dinner!
Toss up between my Dutch oven and my crock pot. Hate having to run the oven all day in the Florida heat.
Wow – I think from all the comments I need to invest in a cast iron skillet. Until then, I use a 10″ deep walled skillet for just about everything.
my big calphalon soup pot! make all kinds of goodies in it!
Our enameled cast iron legumier!
I like to use my mother’s old Revere Ware stainless steel stockpot for making jam and jelly. Not even sure of the size-6 or 8 quarts or so
I can’t live without a stockpot! Soups, chili, applesauce…all for a large family. 🙂
Cast iron skillet! Works for practically everything 🙂
I have a cast iron skillet that used to be my grandmother’s. It’s well-seasoned from years of her cooking potato pancakes and other treats. She’s gone, but the skillet makes me happy to think of her every time I use it. It has become my go-to preserve pan and was my tool of choice when I cooked up a batch of plum jam earlier this summer.
I use my deep skillet basically daily! It’s perfect for searing protein as well as making a yummy sauce!
I love my cast iron dutch oven!
I’m excessively fond of the teal Le Creuset dutch oven my grandmother gave me when I got married.
A tie between my cast iron skillet and my non-stick dutch oven.
I have a 3qt Calphalon chef’s pan that I reach for a lot (right after my slow-cooker).
I own two “real” skillets(aka not part of the Kmart special set of pans I bought for my first apartment) one cast iron perfect for oven adventures and one anonized non stick. Both are basically always out in the kitchen and the non stick one gets a lot of use this time of year for small batches of jam.
I love my rice cooker, because it’s not only a great, non fuss item, but it has many uses. Rice and quinoa, veggie steamer, etc.
My favorite is my Sur la Table nonstick skillet. It cooks like a dream and has a sassy lime green handle and was surprisingly affordable.
A stoneware cloche I picked up at a garage sale for 50 cents. It is amazing.
My favorite piece is my Le Crueset Dutch Oven! I cook everything in it! Extremely versatile and so easy to clean and care for!!
A friend gave me an enameled stockpot, and I love it so much. Granted, the uses for it are limited, but it is by far the best pan I own. It has made me realize what a difference quality cookware can make.
I love my enamel cast iron dutch oven and my 12″ Tfal skillet. Both are used regularly in my kitchen.
Love the dutchoven!
I heart my cast iron Dutch oven!!
I have a Le Crueset Dutch Oven I love for everything. It’s forest green enamel so that tells you how old it is!!
I am obsessed with my cast iron Dutch oven, I do not know what I would do without it!!
My cast iron dutch oven. I love that thing!
My favorite piece of cookware is a beautiful Staub dutch oven that a friend of the family gifted me when I graduated from grad school. I love cooking in it and pretending to be Italian-Irish like its gifter – plus together we make beautiful soups, which are so comforting!
Ooooh… it’s a tie between my cast iron skillet and my dutch oven. I use them both almost daily!
I give my wife a hard time over how much our Le Creuset dutch oven cost us, but hands down, it is one of the most versatile useful pans in our cupboards. That or a good non stick skillet so I can feel like a rockstar “stirring” the pan with a flick of the wrist.
This is a tough one, but I think my very favorite must be a cast iron skillet!
I love my dutch oven!
My cast iron pan is an all-time favorite, especially for eggs.
I love my Allclad items. I use the small sauce pan often since it it perfect for a quick meal. But I also have this shallow curved edge large pot that I love and use for all sorts of things including jam making.
I love my dutch oven. I have an old school flame-colored one.
My favorite piece of cookware is an unmarked dutch oven that my mom bought for me years ago. Everything I make that’s over a quart or so gets cooked in that pan.
I love my Dutch oven, and use it for everything! Although I hear a cast iron skillet is pretty sweet, and it’s worth it to find a well seasoned one at a thrift store or garage sale.
A 10″ cast iron skillet is my current favorite. I use it for everything.
My dutch oven and cast iron skillet. Although they are heavy, I just love cooking with them.
I have to say my favorite piece of cookware is a cast iron skillet. I purchased a new one a few summers ago, but I find myself reaching for my great aunt Sis’ cast iron pan over and over. I love cookware that has a a history 🙂
My vintage cast iron skillets — 10″ and 6″! Frying oysters, biscuits, cornbread, rustic single-crust pies … I’m pretty sure these were my grandmothers’ so maybe 40+ years of seasoning?
**confession** I do use dish soap in them! But I dry well and do the occasional crisco+oven to keep ’em seasoned.
I love my Le Creuset dutch oven which I use for everything, but most recently, roasting a chicken in the oven that came out perfectly!
My favorite pan, believe it or not, is a fry pan I bought for a camping trip. We had forgot to pack our regular camp pan so I picked this one up at a grocery store for $10, I figured it would be a cheaply made pan that I would throw it away when I got home.
That was 21 years ago.
I have a 2 quart copper bottomed Revere ware pot with a glass lid that I love. It’s always the first one I reach for.
My favorite is a Staub dutch oven – a new addition to the kitchen, but I love it.
My favorite piece of cookware is s copper bottomed sauce pan that was my mother’s (I still have the lid!). I use it for everything from boiling potatoes, to making rice or (of course) making sauce.
My favorite is my Le Cruset dutch oven for soups and stews and the all clad non stick skillet for sauteing.
Honestly? I dislike most of my pans (a scattershot collection accumulated through my college years), though I do have a fondness for my white enameled stock pot.
My professional grade half sheet pan that my step son gave me as a Christmas present. I didn’t know pans weren’t supposed to warp! Roast those veggies!
my great, great grandma’s cast iron griddle that came across on the oregon trail!
I love my basics – my sauce pot and my 9×9 glass baking dish 🙂
My absolute favorite is a tiny, burnt orange colored le cruset saucepan with a wooden handle. It really isn’t big enough to use for most of the things I make but it DOES make a perfect serving size of hot chocolate in the winter. I found it at a secondhand kitchen supply place (an absolute hole in the wall) and couldn’t pass it up!
My beat up old baking sheet. Everything goes on that thing.
I have a 6 quart le creuset dutch oven that I bought for 5 dollars at a garage sale. I had always thought, Le Creuset, beautiful, but so pricey, could it be worth it? Yes. While mine is not beautiful, brown, I am guessing a 70’s addition to the Le Creuset family? It is the perfect addition to my kitchen, I would probably pay full price for one!
It’s a toss up between my cast iron skillet and my multi-pot
My favorite piece of cookware are my two cast iron skillets – i try and use them as much as possible! Thanks for the giveaway!
I love my skillet!
My favorite piece of cookware would be my Foley food mill. The aged food mill brings to mind many memories of homemade applesauce in my mother’s kitchen during the fall in Connecticut. Years passed as I went to college and didn’t have much time for baking or cooking, yet at an estate sale I saw a Foley food mill and just had to have it! Thus opening my world up to new memories of my own. My friends will see it in my cupboard and ask what it is and I will again share my many memories…hot, steamy applesauce with cinnamon, a must have for every holiday dinner.
I had to think hard about this one…but I think my fave is my 5 quart Le Creuset dutch oven. But I love my cast iron fry pans, too!
favorite by far is a 12 inch skillet with short handles on each side (I’m sure there’s a proper name for it) I use it almost every single time I cook
I love my enameled cast iron Dutch oven – it is the workhorse I use for every pot of stock, soup and pasta sauce, plus I use it to brown meat and even pan-fry steak! I don’t have very nice lighter-weight cookware, so for anything needing a pot bigger than a couple quarts, out comes the Lodge.
My cast iron skillets, griddle and enameled Dutch ovens. They make me so happy! And well fed 🙂
i got a giant 12-quart enameled stockpot in pale green for christmas last year. i love that i can fit about 6 pint jars in that beauty, so i can put up medium-sized batches without dragging the giant two-burner pot out from the basement! easier process = MORE canning!!
Stock pot
When I moved into my first apartment, my parents visited thrift shops for weeks until they found me three cast iron skillets – two large, one saucepan – to get started with. They are by far my favorite pieces of cookware!
I love my T-fal non-stick skillets. Nothing sticks to them, not even tofu.
I love my enameled Dutch oven. It’s a bit big for cooking for two but I love it. I may have to downsize for an everyday pan.
The 10″ cast iron skillet, or the 8 quart stainless steel stock pot…I love them both because they heat evenly and seem indestructible.
A little embarrassed to admit it…but I love my egg poaching pan. I never mastered the art of poaching eggs in boiling water so this pan is a life saver…I can also take the egg poaching insert out and use it as a regular stainless steel pan, which I love for making jam. 🙂
Thanks for the chance to win!
I use my cast iron skillet on a daily basis, it is my go to brown, fry, and bake in.
A small WMF pot that I use for pretty much everything is my favorite kitchen item!
I’s say it’s a toss-up between my 3.5 qt Le Creuset Dutch oven and my reversible Lodge stove-top grill/griddle. Both make my life immeasurably better than it was before they entered my world.
Probably my wide and low Revereware pan. I do most of my jam making in it. After that, my flat cast iron tortilla pan.
I have a lovely stainless steel Sur La Table covered skillet that I use for just about everything. I also love my crummy old Rival crock pot.
I love my enameled cast iron dutch oven. I make everything in it!
I love my deep 10″ stainless pan — part of a cheap set but totally the best!
I don’t know that it’s my favorite, but my girlfriend has a tiny non-stick skillet that’s mostly only useful for cooking one or two eggs at a time. But it’s the first piece of non-stick I’ve used in years, and I’m realizing what I’ve been missing by avoiding it for so long!
My absolute favorite piece of cookware is a random 12 inch skillet my husband’s old landlord gave us as a wedding gift. We didn’t register for it, but boy do we use it (nearly everyday)!
A large, deep skillet from Costco (Kirkland brand). I do a lot of jam making in it.
Is it bad that I don’t have a favorite piece of cookware? I’m only recently getting into cooking. I have a basic set of pots and pans and that’s about it.
I have a couple of pots from the IKEA 365 line that I use all the time…stainless and dishwasher-safe. But for true love the copper jam pot that I inherited from my sister.
My cast iron dutch oven…..I love it but you need a crane to move it.
My favorite piece of cookware is this giant, super thin plastic spatula I got when I was in college. Can’t live without it.
Hands down favorite is the popcorn pan: a larger saucepan bequeathed to me by my roommate at the end of our respective master’s programs in 2002. By the end of that year it was nicely weathered by daily popcorn use and a layer of melted on plastic bag on the bottom (oops, did not realize I had inadvertently laid it on the bag while hot, yet another reason to say yes to re-usable fabric bags)…my roommate left it with me as I had seemingly ruined it’s looks;). Great for a smaller pot of soup and doubling as my lid pan this season (a nice dousing in vinegar cleans up the inside after a weekend of preserving).
Got a Farberware stainless stockpot back in 1989 and it’s served me well through years of soups, pastas, and even popcorn!
I love our Dutch Oven. It’s amazing how many uses I find for it!
My favorite piece of cookware is my small square cast iron – it makes the perfect breakfast for one!
My all time favorite is my Lodge Combo Cooker. It serves as a shallow pan, a medium pot, and a Dutch oven. I use it for everything from caramelizing onions to baking bread!