Strawberry Jam

The primary intention of buying a flat of strawberries this past week was to make strawberry jam. It's my favorite jam and making it homemade just has a much more fresh flavor and isn't too sugary like the jello-like jelly or jam you buy at the store. I have boil-water canned jams before, but I chose to make freezer jam as I've typically done before. It's so easy and I also like not having to fret over whether my jars will seal properly. I can just let the jam set and store them in the freezer for up to a year. So, several quarts of strawberries later, I now have around 30 jars of bright red jam ready to enjoy this next year.

The longest part of the process is preparing the fruit. But, while watching my favorite Food Network shows, I stemmed, hulled and washed all my strawberries.

I like the jam to have nice chunks of fruit in it, so I just crushed the berries with a potato masher vs. pureeing them in my food processor.

I mixed the Sure-Jell pectin to help it set in with the sugar and brought it to a boil.

The pectin-sugar mixture was blended with the fruit and then I spooned it into all my jars.

My favorite use of strawberry jam is for scones. I had some in the freezer, so I thawed them and delivered some fresh jam to my mum and we had afternoon tea together with fresh baked scones and strawberry jam.

Victoria Sponge

Victoria sponge is one of my favorite teatime sweets. I've had it several times at tea rooms in England and wanted to make one myself for my mum and I to enjoy with tea on a sunny afternoon. We remembered our favorite Victoria sponge that we enjoyed at a cute cottage tea room outside Polegate, where my mum grew up. Another reason I decided to make it now was that Victoria day was just this past weekend. While it's not an American holiday, it does honor Queen Victoria's birthday. Victoria sponge cake was named after the long reigning Queen Victoria who started hosting tea parties to get back into society after the death of her husband, Prince Albert. Sponge cakes were served at her tea parties that became known as "Victoria sponges." Traditional Victoria sponge cake consists of two sponge cakes sandwiched with a layer of jam (typically strawberry) and cream, which is why it is sometimes referred to as Victoria sandwich cake. The top is typically not iced, but simply sprinkled with fine sugar or confectioners' sugar.

The sponge cake batter was easy to make, but this was my second attempt. The first one was a flop. Well, not so much of a flop as it did taste good, but didn't rise whatsoever. Part way through the baking process, I realized that the recipe didn't call for baking powder. However, it did call for self rising flour...oops. It did taste good, but it was really more of a pound cake than a light sponge cake.

The cakes baked nicely and while they didn't rise all that much, they were a perfect buttery and airy sponge cake.

I then made my cream filling while the cakes cooled. It was just butter, confectioners' sugar and a little milk, much like traditional buttercream.

To assemble the cake, it was a layer of strawberry jam (my last jar of homemade jam) and a layer of cream.

The second layer of sponge cake went on top. It just doesn't look complete like this, does it?

I used a little sifter to evenly sprinkle confectioners' sugar on top and added some fresh strawberries. Much better!

It was the perfect combination of buttery sponge cake, fresh flavorful jam and cream that paired well with a cup of cream tea we enjoyed sitting out on the deck.

Scones with Strawberry Jam

I have written about the scones we enjoyed in England last summer and the awful scones we had at the Crown & Crumpet in San Fran, but I've yet to write about my own scone recipe. My scones are more of the English style scones that are a biscuit like shape and texture. I don't much care for the triangular shaped scones that most cafe's and bakeries have and they always seem to be very dry, tasteless and covered in huge crystals of sugar. What's special about mine? I always use pure full fat unsalted butter. It's best to use unsalted to control the amount of salt in the recipe and most scone recipes don't call for much sugar, so it's good not to overdo it on the salt, especially for fruit scones. You also must use baking raisins. Most people don't know they exist, but you can buy Sunmaid baking raisins in 1 cup pouches in most grocery stores. They are much juicier for baking unlike those dry pebbles of raisins that come in boxes. They are great for scones, but also for oatmeal raisin cookies and even to put in your morning oatmeal. I use a scalloped biscuit cutter and you can also make different sizes. I usually do this to make some smaller ones more suited for afternoon tea vs. the bigger "breakfast size" scones with the larger biscuit cutter. When baked just the right amount of time, they are moist but not doughy, rise nicely and break apart perfectly without the need for a knife...aside for spreading on the clotted cream and strawberry jam! I enjoyed afternoon tea with Audrey last weekend and used the last of my homemade strawberry jam.