When life gives you organic apricots you make jam! Or wine!! Or fruit leathers and smoothies and chutney!! Despite years of natural living I am still skeptical when someone offers anything sugar free or gluten free. The trick is to make the alternatives as good or better than the traditional recipe. Not disgusting. A friend recently shared a sugar free chutney recipe. I was not convinced but I sampled it and was blown away! So I decided to experiment. After all we've recently processed a couple crates of delicious organic apricots.
FarmerBuckaroo is always accommodating in testing my experiments. If he likes them then I know they are good! This apricot jam is too delicious not too share. Of course, food recipes IMO need to be simple enough for my little ones to be able to make. Because they helped pick and dehydrate, I decided to involve them in the making of sugar free jam!! This turned out to be a homeschooling exercise that ticked all the boxes.
Because apricots are slightly tart I added medjool dates to sweeten the jam. We recently received 10kg of fresh medjool dates from a farmer friend in the Kalahari. Yup - TEN - kgs! I love food that has a surprise in it. Chilli chocolate. Citrus in cheesecake. Rosehips in rooibos. Coriander in - well almost anything. So I tried two varieties of sugar-free apricot jam. One with fresh peppermint and the other with fresh ginger. They were both a roaring success!
And here is the recipe!!
APRICOT JAM - WITH A TWIST!
200g dehydrated organic Apricots
80 g depitted medjool Dates
1cm slice of fresh ginger OR a few sprigs of peppermint
1 cup spring water (maybe more)
Dash of cinnamon
Soak the dehydrated apricots and dates in the cup of water overnight. The fruit must be just submerged!
In your food processor blend the dried fruit with the sliver of ginger and dash of cinnamon. If the consistency is too thick then slowly drizzle in more water. Blend until smooth. It is important to taste the jam. I found I needed to add more ginger. It is important to used dehydrated (or sun dried fruit) as the flavour is very intense and has a longer shelf life.
On a slice of freshly baked sourdough bread this apricot jam barely touches sides! It is incredibly hot in the Karoo at the moment and so I have frozen small amounts of the jam to use as we need. I also found that a spoon of the apricot jam in each bottle of kombucha - on the second ferment - makes for a fizz extravaganza! Naturally, I am relieved that I don't have to sweat for hours over a pot of sugary fruit cooking to jam. Who would know sugar free could be such a wonderous taste sensation!
