Hey everyone! Welcome back. I am now officially back in Cornwall! In the last blog post, I made traditional British sloe gin with wild sloes — blackthorn berries — I picked. As amazing as gin is, you can also use sloes to make jams and jellies. And this gave me an idea for something to try: hawthorn berry jam.
From the Victoria Sponge to a Jam Swiss Roll in Tesco, jam is one of the most important ingredients in British cuisine.
They can be used on practically anything that’s sweet; it’s not only practical. It’s importance is both cultural and historical. For a few reasons.
During the first and second world wars, jam was a high-calorie food that could better preserve surplus fruit. By turning this fruit into jams, it lengthened their shelf life. Which was helpful since fridges weren’t a regular thing in the field. And making jam at home is a popular and fun family activity.
What can I say? The British just love jams.
But I didn’t make raspberry or strawberry jam. Because normal is one thing my blog isn’t. So I made one with hawthorn berries or “haws”. As you’ve probably guessed, these grow on the common hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna).
Blackthorn (Prunus spinosa) and hawthorn are related, but not as closely as blackthorn is to plums. Hawthorn is more like that distant cousin who one day decided to move in next door. And it just so happens they have a lot in common. They’re both shrubs, both have thorns, and they both like to grow near each other.
And they’re both deciduous. In English, that means their leaves fall off in autumn. Without their leaves, flowers or berries, it can be a little tricky telling them apart. But I’ve got you covered.
One way you can tell is by the bark. Being called blackthorn, its bark is darker. Big surprise. And it’s smoother (except for the thorns). Meanwhile, hawthorn bark is more of a brownish cream colour. And it’s much rougher, with fissures and knots that make the bark look like my lips in winter.
Another way to tell is through the thorns themselves. Both blackthorn and hawthorn have gnarly-looking thorns. But blackthorn thorns are longer and have leaf buds growing along them.
Don’t worry guys. It gets easier once they grow their leaves back. Blackthorn leaves are small, oval-shaped and have toothed edges. Hawthorn leaves have deep lobes with jagged edges. Sorta like parsley if you asked me to draw parsley.
Then there are the fruits. There’s no way you can mix them up. Unless you’re blind. Sloes from blackthorn are bluish-black, and haws from hawthorn are red. Bare in mind this is only when they’re fully ripe.
Because hawthorn likes to hang around blackthorn, it’s found in the same kinds of places: hedgerows, woods edges, etc. And there’s this really good spot I found where the shrubs were growing some huge haws.
Most of haws are about the size of peas; these were the size of marbles. And they had this nice crimson shade.
So you best believe this was the place I did my picking. But I didn’t pick as many as I wanted to avoid over-picking.
While looking at my little haul of haws, I thought they looked like tiny tomatoes. Then I stopped looking because their red skin was gleaming like heaven’s gates and it hurt my eyes. Also, it had been raining that morning so the haws were soaked but I forgot to line a paper towel in my box. Because my hippocampus decided to clock out for the day.
I’m pretty sure the rain would’ve washed off any dirt and bugs on them but just to be safe, I let the haws sit in some cold water. From this angle I photographed them, they look like they were frozen in ice. Very trippy.
Then I poured all the trippy water out and put the haws in a shallow bowl. Now they were so intensely red they almost looked AI-generated.
Before making any jam, it’s important to have something ready to keep the jam in. A jam jar. But it has to be sterilised to stop the jam from spoiling. Wash it out with soap and water, and rinse until there’s no soap residue. There’s a few ways you can then sterilise it; I chose boiling. Boil it for 10 minutes on medium heat.
If the jar has any labels glued on it, boiling should let you peel them straight off. No sweat.
When you take the jar out (you should let it cool down), you can leave it to air-dry.
With the haws and jar cleansed of all their sins, it was time to start the long painstaking process of making the jam. First put the haws into a saucepan and fill it with water.
Not too much water though. You fill the pan too much and the juice is gonna be too watery. You want just enough to submerge the haws, but also enough to account for the water evaporating. Making jam is a science, not an art.
When you’re boiling, you wanna keep the heat on low and just let the haws simmer. Low and slow: that’s the key. As they boil, you’ll probably notice their colour changing. They go from the most intense red you’ve ever seen to a pinkish colour. Like the colour of a pink lady apple. Their skins will also split and expose the yellow flesh inside.
Boil them until they’ve all split their skins. This’ll make mashing them a hell of a lot easier. Luckily, I came fully equipped to mash and strain.
After a short while (it took mine about 25 minutes) the haws should be done. They’ll be smelling slightly sweet yet starchy. Kinda like cooked sweet potato. This smell will get stronger as you mash the absolute s*** out of them.
If you were making a jelly, I’d recommend using this thing called a jelly bag. But since we’re making jam, it’s totally fine to use a sieve to strain your mashed haws. You’re gonna start by straining what looks like kimchi — or baby food.
In the middle of straining all this crap, I found the seeds from the haws. Like sloes, haws have a single big seed inside. About the size of a lemon seed.
On a random side note, I think it’s cool how Nathaniel Hawthorne near enough shares a name with this shrub. Great writer; not as good for turning to jam.
Because I didn’t gather as many haws, there wasn’t as much juice. Don’t get put off by the vomit colour. That’s gonna be fixed in a bit.
Once you’ve got all the juice, pour it back into a clean saucepan and let it simmer on low heat. As it simmers, squeeze some lemon juice into it. The acidity from lemon juice lowers the pH of the juice and creates a chemical reaction that neutralises the negative charges on the pectin. This means the pectin can assemble their network and allow the jam to set after it’s done. Like I said, it’s a science.
Next comes the sweet white gold: sugar. I sprinkled in five tablespoons of caster sugar. One tablespoon at a time. Now full disclosure, I could only find one recipe for British hawthorn berry jam. And despite being based in the UK, it only gives imperial units. Go figure.
You’ll notice some bubbles forming every time you add some of the sugar. It doesn’t take long for those bubbles to begin bubbling like molten lava. And that’s exactly what it feels like if you accidentally touch it. So try not to touch it.
The longer the jam bubbles, the more water evaporates, and the thicker it gets. Always make sure you’re stirring it even after you’ve stirred in all of the sugar, or it’ll burn at the bottom of the pan. You should stir it until it’s thick enough to coat the back of a spoon.
Here’s a hack: while you’re stirring, quickly put the jar in the microwave for two minutes (without the lid). The jar has to be hot so when you pour in your jam lava, the glass doesn’t crack or explode because of the thermal shock. After pouring it in, immediately screw the lid on the jar to create a vacuum seal.
As you can see I made…some jam. But they do say “quality over quantity”. The quality wasn’t great either. It was super thick and nearly unspreadable. I might’ve squeezed too much lemon juice. On the bright side, it smelt and tasted good. Like tangy glazed cherries.
Keeping the British theme, I used it to make a cream tea. Since I’m in Cornwall and don’t want the Cornish to invade my house, I spread the jam first and Cornish clotted cream second. Then I messed it up by making sandwiches out of the scones. That’s what made sense in my mind.
My housemates — who are all British — were having a grand time laughing at my abominations. And then eating them. I’m definitely sticking to metric units in my next jam attempt. Also, I’m thinking of doing more cooking-related posts in the future. Let me know what you think.
See you guys in the next post. Stay straying!