So here's the short of it, 
Fun in the kitchen tonight -  Preserved Cherries.

And here's the long.

Today I got a big box of junk cleaned out and decided to treat myself by making a batch of Cherry Preserves. It's my first time to try and I think they came out very well.

This is a recipe from a blog I read.  The author is Tori Avey. She has an interest in Jewish Cooking and in Historical Cooking. I have tried several of her recipes. I was especially taken with this one as it is titled Martha Washington's Perserved Cherries. It came from a very old cook book that apparently was taken from Martha Washngton's copied out recipes.  Check out the blog for a bit of the history.  I like the idea of making something that people have been making for generations. This recipe was so simple and didn't really take much effort at all except for pitting the cherries.  Get the recipe here.

The first job was to pit the cherries. I've never really used cherries in a recipe before so my pitting in the past was limited to spitting them out after I popped one in my mouth! I don't have a cherry pitter - and I really don't want one - I really don't need another kitchen tool that has only one use for only one season of the year!  I found a technique using a paper clip or bobby pin - it sounded pretty work intense.  I found a great YouTube video for bending a fork into a tool for scooping out the pit - didn't want to ruin a fork and didn't want to go out and buy a cheap one - and I thought it still looked pretty work intense. So I decided to try the one using a pastry tip -- except I didn't have one. I did however have a very small funnel. So I turned the funnel upside down in a large metal bowl down in the sink.  The object here was to capture as much of the mess as possible. I pulled off the stem and then punched the cherry down onto the stem of the funnel. It popped the seed right out of the bottom of the cherry!  It was so easy - so simple! And I got a little more than two pounds of cherries pitted in no time at all.  I'm so glad to know about this technique.




The recipe is really just cooking the cherries in a simple syrup until they become soft.  There is this step of skimming the foam off as they cook. And there is an instruction to cook them in a very wide dish and to be sure to use a metal spoon.  I have another recipe that specifically calls for a wooden spoon.

I got several jars of preserved cherries as well as a bottle and a half of cherry juice.  I'm thinking cherry coke, cherry lemonade, cherry frosting, cherries in brownies, cherries on vanilla ice cream.

My first idea I think will be to put my homemade chocolate sauce on some vanilla ice cream and then put the cherry preserve juice on top!