Making Rhubarb Jam

Female Speaker: A counting calf. Eric: This is the smartest horse in the world. Female Speaker: These are bad bar manners is what those are. Eric: Hey hey! Female Speaker: Oh Oh! Eric: So today on gardenfork we are going to cook Rhubarb and for once we are not going to make Rhubarb cobbler or Rhubarb crisp. We are going to make Rhubarb --he listens well doesn't he, we are going to make Rhubarb jam and Cash here can't come, but we want to come up to the bar and show you guys a little bit of our friend here, the race horse who is doing quite well in his training. Female Speaker: He is a dressage horse. Eric: He is now a dressage horse, who can't count. Female Speaker: And he can't count it, actually his trainer will be uphold however. Eric: His trainer doesn't have high-speed internet. So anyway I have never made Rhubarb jam before and we are also going to try our first attempt at canning which should be very interesting. Come here Mitch, come here! Female Speaker: It's a hit. Eric: You want to take it out of the package first. It sounds right here. Female Speaker: Now you look showered. Eric: Yeah I have shaved. Female Speaker: Oh you have not taken shower. Eric: Oh, after the rain! So we need some Rhubarb for our Rhubarb jam. So where we live it, it grows like a weed. So we are just going to harvest some. Female Speaker: Even though it's like almost beginning of summer, you can still use your Rhubarb. Eric: Yeah, yeah. Female Speaker: And then it must, you should've said eat it spring! Eric: Now in the early summer you can harvest it too. You know, there is a balance to be made but up here the rhubarb start to kind of die out in the middle of the summer. Female Speaker: When it gets hot. Eric: When it gets hot. Female Speaker: If it ever gets hot. Eric: But you know it looks pretty darn healthy right now. So harvesting we are supposed to get five cups of rhubarb. So I am sure within here we can get five cups of rhubarb. Female Speaker: Easily. Eric: Yeah. So we are going to take rhubarb and chop up five cups of rhubarb. Female Speaker: What's going on back there? Eric: We are going to take our rhubarb jam, it's a rhubarb strawberry pineapple jam actually and we are going to try and can it. People have been asking about doing a canning episode. This isn't the official canning episode but -- Female Speaker: It's the unofficial canning... Eric: It's the un -this is kind of fly-by made-by, just went on the web and try to figure it out and we have some canning jars and right kind of lids and everything. Female Speaker: And you saw what happened with the smoked salmon. Eric: Yeah, right! Female Speaker: Did you have to wash it? Eric: Well, yeah! You got to wash the rhubarb, just kind of run it under water. I am going to sharpen my knife. Female Speaker: I think it look likes sibling rivalry or something. More twister perhaps just a twister. Eric: My knife is really dull so I am going to sharpen it with my knife sharpener. This thing takes all the guess work. It takes all the guess work out of kind of get the right kind of angle on your blade and everything. It is really nice! Sharp! It is great it is really because trying to do it with stone and everything, I can't do it. Female Speaker: So does it matter if the rhubarb is green or red. Eric: You know it's kind of a static thing but I don't think so. This recipe has been around for long time. There is a lot of variation on it, on the web. This is my version, there is a couple on the web that have a way too much sugar I think, on... Female Speaker: Doesn't look like need to add sugar? Eric: Not always I like the tartness of rhubarb, but this has Jell-O gelatin in it which is kind of cheater. But I think you'll like it. I have never eaten rhubarb raw before. Female Speaker: Really we can look that, again at your face. Eric: Wow. Female Speaker: It will do. Did you just say I like the tartness? Maybe you'll go spit it out like those wine people. Eric: Okay we have got five cups in here but we got a bunch of extra rhubarb. So did you know that you can... Female Speaker: You have been covering what was ingredient? Eric: Well that's kind of when we have a really hot chilly pepper but the opposite. But you can freeze rhubarb. So let me show you how okay. First just chop it up. Okay so you have all this extra rhubarb and you wonder what to do with that. You just put it on a sheet, our cooking sheet and then we are going to do what's call, I think they call it flash freezing. You just put this in the freezer until the stuff freezes which is an hour or two. You want all of them in one layer and you put them in your freezer. We are also going to put in some strawberries. Female Speaker: That just bounces the tartness. Eric: Yeah it's a classic mixture. It's a classic combination is rhubarb and strawberries. Female Speaker: The pot is fidgeting on the stove. Eric: This is the beauty of can stuff. To this we are going to add one can, 20 ounce a can of crushed pine apple, and then I am going to add a cup of water. Okay we are going to put this on stove and cook it down. Female Speaker: Stir it up. Eric: Yeah we'll stir it up too. We have got a big pot of water here boiling and this is going to be our canning pot. So I had to get that kind of preheated because of our little stove here. Female Speaker: Have you ever canned anything? Eric: No I have never done this before. So it is virgin episode of canning. Female Speaker: So good luck! Eric: No it's easy! I went to about.com actually and learned once again how to do something. So little free plug for somebody to sponsor us. Female Speaker: I think most people don't have this thing kind of stove we have. Eric: This is a fancy, very fancy stove. People want our stove! Female Speaker: Have you ever had anybody say, I want your stove? Eric: So it's going to cook this down. Female Speaker: But how long? Eric: About fifteen minutes. Female Speaker: That's it. Eric: You want it to bubble down. Yeah it cooks fairly quickly. Female Speaker: Is it on high? Eric: Oh wait, wait! I forget to add something. Female Speaker: Sugar. Eric: Yeah sugar. Female Speaker: Henry, are you embraced? Eric: Two cups of sugar, forgot! There are recipes for this kind of jam, for up the five cups of sugar which I think is way too much. Female Speaker: Even tough, you've just tasted the rhubarb. Do you still think it's too much? Eric: Yes. Female Speaker: Remember your rhubarb reaction. Did you just say I like the tartness? Eric: I like the tartness. I just don't like it that tart. So we are going to put two cups of sugar and also when we put the Jell-O, we're going to put this Jell-O gelatin in here this has like a cup of sugar in it as well so. Oh it's already bubbling, see! Female Speaker: Oh it smells good!