First Frost Green Tomato Jam

Things have quickly moved towards winter over the last two weeks & we've barely had a day over 50 F. Last week we had our first frost warning so I quickly harvested the last of the crop from our garden.

But that still left a lot of green tomatoes on the vine. I hated to let those green tomatoes go to waste. I love green fried tomatoes but the type of tomato we grew is a paste tomato & not very good for just eating fresh. I seemed to remember hearing of green tomato jam so I started searching the web.

Most of the recipes I found consisted of using a flavored jello saying that the finish product tasted like the other fruit. I knew that wasn't what I was looking for so the search continued. Well, then I found that Lori at Lori's Lipsmacking Goodness had made two versions of green tomato jam last year. Both sounded great, version 1 was flavored with vanilla & ginger while version 2 used ginger, allspice & cinnamon. Lori raved about version 2 saying her husband was eating it straight from the jar with a spoon so I figured that was the one to try. It really is tasty & I can't wait to try it over cream cheese on a cracker.

This recipe does take 3 days (giving the tomatoes time to break down & get infused with the flavors) but its really not much work on days 1 & 2. Because of the amount of tomatoes we had I doubled the original recipe. I stuck to the recipe for days 1 & 2 but made some changes come day 3. First of all I put my tomatoes through my food mill to really break them down. Then Lori said the finished product had the consistency on corn or maple syrup but I wanted something a little thicker so I let it cook longer on day three. Our version wasn't as thick as a jam using pectin but a thick spread. Finally, I feel more comfortable with canning in a water bath compared to the method she uses so that's that I did.

First Frost Green Tomato Jam
(adapted from Lori's Lipsmacking Goodness)

3 lbs green tomatoes, quartered & seeded (weighed is after seeding)
4 inch piece fresh ginger, peeled & minced
5 1/2 c granulated sugar
6 T lemon juice
2 cinnamon stick
1 t allspice

Day 1: Combine tomatoes, ginger, sugar and lemon juice in a large glass bowl. Cover the bowl & allow to sit overnight at room temperature.

Day 2: The tomatoes should have releases a lot of liquid. Pour everything from the bowl into a large heavy bottomed pan. Add the cinnamon sticks & allspice. Bring to a boil. reduce heat & let simmer for 10 minutes. Pour everything back into a clean glass bowl. Refrigerate overnight.

Day 3: Put the mixture through a food mill using the medium blade. Get as much through as possible. Then finely chop any skins that remain in the food mill. (If you don't have a food mill you could chop things finely in a food processor). Put everything in a large heave bottomed pot & bring to a boil. Reduce & let boil gently for 1/2 - 1 hours until thickened, it should reduce almost half.

Meanwhile prepare 5 jars & lids for canning by boiling the jars in water at least 1-inch over the top of the jars for 20 minutes & the lids for 5 minutes. Remove hot jars from the water & fill with hot jam leaving 1/4-inch head room. Remove any air bubbles. Wipe the rims of the jars to clean any spilled jam. Top with lids & screw on neckbands. Return jars to the boiling water bath, with at least 1-inch of water over the top of the jars. Boil for 15 minutes. Turn off heat & let sit for 5 minutes. Remove jars from the water & let sit undisturbed for 12 hours. The tops of the jars should pull downward & pop, if any don't either reprocess that jar or refrigerate to use.

Makes 5 cups.

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