Spreads

Make this in late June or early July when strawberries are abundant at your local farmers’ market, and you’ll enjoy it for months to come. Pectin, a water-soluble substance used as a thickener in jams and jellies, is available in many supermarkets. Serve this jam with any of Bubby’s fruit breads or muffins. You can also substitute blackberries, raspberries, or blueberries for the strawberries. You can mix the berries, too. Though you don’t need to sterilize the three 1-quart storage jars, you should wash the berries well. We are not canning here, or sealing, so it’s not the same process. This jam will keep for three to four weeks in the refrigerator.

A luxurious spread for bagels that is so much better than ordinary cream cheese, this will keep for about a week in the refrigerator. For best results, remove the cream cheese from the refrigerator about an hour or so before you plan to use it, so it will soften.

A beautiful pink, intensely flavored butter, this can be made with either fresh or frozen, thawed berries. The butter should be a little cooler than room temperature when you whip it. Take the butter out of the refrigerator a half hour to an hour before you plan to use it, so it can soften.

A fresh take on the deli favorite, smoked whitefish salad, this version is full of herbs and dressed up by sweet cherry tomatoes. Smoked fish is salty, so you may not need to salt the purée. The fillets contain tiny bones, but as a general rule, the smallest ones are soft and edible. Rainbow or golden trout farmed in the United States is a recommended seafood choice because unlike many carnivorous farmed fish—which eat more protein than they provide to humans—trout efficiently convert their feed into protein. What’s more, rainbow and golden trout are mostly farm-raised in tanks, so there is little risk of them contaminating wild populations.

When I see Jonagold apples at the market, I buy them, always thinking of my sister, Jona. My parents got a little creative with her name. It’s feminine for John, my father’s name. A blend between Jonathan and Golden Delicious, Jonagold apples are great for apple butter and applesauce. They have a tendency to soften in the refrigerator, so they are best used shortly after harvest.

Muscadines are wild American grapes native to the Southeast. Scuppernongs are a variety of muscadines. Both grapes have a tough, thick skin that ranges in color from deep purple to greenish bronze. There are scuppernong and Muscadine arbors more than fifty years old at my family’s home. The thick branches are gnarled and twisted, forming a large canopy instead of growing in a row like traditional grapes. Dede made muscadine wine and stored it in the basement. It was unfiltered and quite sweet. We recently found a bottle, at least twelve years old, that had aged and mellowed to a honey liqueur. The wine-making ended when Dede passed away, but Meme and Mama have always made jelly from the copious amounts of fruit. I think I was in first grade when I had my first taste of store-bought jelly. It was the ubiquitous Concord grape jelly of childhood, and I remember not liking it. I had never had jelly before that wasn’t homemade. My friend’s mother very likely thought I was either a complete brat or a complete hick. As children, my sister and I would stand for hours at the arbor, using both hands and mechanically eating the fruit like locusts. We’d squeeze the fruit into our mouths and spit out the seeds and bitter skins. Once, I reached into the arbor to pick a greenish globe and just as my fingers started to close on the fruit, it moved. My scuppernong was the head of a green snake. Scared out of my wits, I ran screaming into the house. Meme’s constant reminder about staying out of the bushes because of snakes had finally come true.

There’s an incredible cookware store in Paris called Dehillerin. When I lived in France as a poor student, I would scrimp and save so I could buy one copper pot a year. Even though times eventually became richer, I still stick to my rule of one pot a year. One summer at La Varenne, after many marathon sessions making preserves, I decided my one purchase would be a copper confiture pot. This special French pot is designed specifically for making jams and jellies. It is large and wide at the rim, providing a large surface area, which allows a mixture to evaporate and thicken quickly during cooking. Trouble was, I was purchasing this mammoth pot on my way home to the U.S. after many months in France; I had no room for it in my luggage. I’m not certain whether they would now consider it a possible weapon, but that summer I flew home with my shiny new confiture pot saddled snugly in my lap.

Blueberries bring to mind fingers stained purple-blue, fruity pies and cobblers, and warm, fresh-from-the-oven muffins. When buying blueberries, look for plump, firm, fresh berries that are a light, powdery, blue-gray. If refrigerated, fresh blueberries will keep for up to three weeks. When blueberries are in season, freeze them in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet. Once they are frozen solid, transfer to a freezer-safe container. This is a basic formula for making jam. I’ve added a small amount of candied ginger at the end. The underlying ginger flavor is subtle, but it really complements the blueberry.

Mayonnaise is a subject of much debate in the South. I’ve even heard rumors about a veritable barroom-type brawl between chefs at the Southern Foodways Symposium in Oxford, Mississippi, that rose out of a discussion of Duke’s versus Hellmann’s. I grew up on Duke’s mayonnaise and strongly believe that if it’s not homemade, it’s got to be Duke’s! This recipe uses raw eggs. Pregnant women, young children, the elderly, or anyone whose health or immune system is compromised should not consume raw eggs. Otherwise, for healthy adults, homemade mayonnaise is fine.

Use this flavorful compound butter, known in French cuisine as beurre maître d’hôtel, on toasts, to saute vegetables, to toss with pasta-—the possibilities are endless. Vary the herbs as well. For example, try basil, garlic, and Parmigiano-Reggiano for an Italian flavor.

The Eastern seaboard—especially the Chesapeake Bay—is riddled with shallow muddy inlets of brackish water, the perfect home for blue crabs. Grades of crabmeat depend on which part of the crab the meat is from and the size of the pieces. Jumbo lump is the most expensive and is composed of the largest pieces of white body meat. Lump crab is next and is harvested from the back fin. Flake is the smallest pieces of white body meat. Claw meat is the darker meat from the claw and is the least expensive. Look for fresh or pasteurized crab in your seafood department and avoid the canned, shelf-stable product. Serve this dip with water crackers or toasted slices of baguette.

The slow cooker is an excellent tool for making small batches of jams and preserves—just enough for a week’s worth of morning toast—without any fuss at all. You can use your stovetop recipes, just adjust for longer cooking times. Begin on low and end on high with the cover off, and plan on watching somewhat carefully for the last hour. Forsake the pectin and enjoy the spoonable texture of nothing but fruit.

Tapenade is essentially puréed olives with other flavorings added. This is a pretty mild version, but if you like the sharp taste of Kalamata olives, feel free to add more.

This is a most excellent appetizer and it couldn’t be easier to make. You just put everything in the blender and it’s done in about 30 seconds. You can’t beat that.

Mung beans are a staple legume in many Asian kitchens, where their delicate, buttery flavor lends richness to both savory and sweet treats. Like red beans, mung beans can be made into a lightly sweet paste to be stuffed inside a baked or steamed bun or dumpling. In fact, the two bean pastes are practically interchangeable. Whereas sweetened red bean paste is vaguely chocolate-like, sweetened mung bean paste resembles marzipan, both in texture and nuanced flavor. This is a Vietnamese version of the paste, with vanilla to round out the flavor and salt to inject a little oomph. Mung beans are sold at many Asian markets and health food stores. Look for the yellow ones that have been hulled and split. The green ones still have their tough skins.

To those unfamiliar with red bean paste, the concept may seem strange, but millions of people the world over cannot imagine their favorite steamed or baked buns and deep-fried sesame seed balls without this lightly sweet, chocolate-brown filling. The richness comes from the beans themselves and from a touch of oil, though lard would be used by traditionalists. Some cooks use brown or white sugar; I use both for a deep, well-rounded sweetness. Red bean paste is sold canned, but it’s overly sweet and incomparable to homemade. Adzuki beans are available at most natural food stores, specialty grocers, and Asian markets. You can also use the small red beans sold at Chinese markets. Sometimes I add a pinch or two of salt for a savory edge, reflecting a Japanese style of bean paste. The recipe here is more in the sweeter Chinese fashion.

This is one of the most beautiful marmalades I know of. As the delicate shreds of quince cook, they turn brilliant red and intensify in color as the fruit reduces to a fragrant, shimmering jelly. This preserve is terrific at breakfast or as a filling for Easy Marmalade Tart (page 93). It’s also great paired with slices of Manchego or Cheddar cheese, served with a glass of sherry. This marmalade was inspired by a recipe from Helen Witty’s book Fancy Pantry.

I make this marmalade in the dead of winter whenever my collection of confitures is running low, since, happily, good pineapple is always available. One pineapple yields a lot of jam—another thing to be happy about. The best way to judge if a pineapple is truly ripe is to take a whiff. If the fruit is ripe, it will smell strong and sweet and the flesh will be sweet, too. Using the old wives’ tale method of plucking a leaf from the top just means you’re going to get strange looks from the people in the produce department. And if you do it in France, where I live, you might even be reprimanded.