Yard work, cannning jam

I finished up a few things outside today. But once again it was hot as blazes out there. Ya know, I should have lost a lot of weight by not but it has not happened so far. I think I sweated at least 10 lb off just what little time I was outside. I picked up the rest of my ground cherries that had fallen when I pulled up the plants yesterday.

I had already picked some before and had them in the fridge.

I got online and did a search and found a jam recipe that sounded really good. It was Ground cherry and orange jam. This is how its done.

4 to 5 cups of ground cherries, husked.
1/2 cup water.
1 orange, flesh finely chopped, an the zest grated
1 pk of sure jell
4 cups sugar.

Cook ground cherries till soft or you can use a stick blender to mash them up. Add the prepared orange  and sure jell to ground cherries. Simmer for about 3 minutes. Add sugar all at once and stir to dissolve. Boil hard till it test done for jelly and sheets from the spoon. Put into hot jars and seal. If you water bath your jam and jelly do so for 10 minutes in boiling water bath. This is really some tasty stuff. I know cause I got to lick the kettle. This recipe makes about 5 - 1/2 pint jars of jam. It has a taste reminiscent of orange marmalade and hint of pineapple. A really nice treat to make from a fruit that grows wild here in Kentucky. The plants look somewhat like a tomato or tomatillo and the fruit grows like tomatillos as well. They will grow in poor soil and ripen in late July to mid August. These little treasures are also loaded with beta-carotene or Vitamin A. So a jam that might just be good for the body on your morning toast.
I have been saving some seed from  a tomato plant that hitchhiked its way to the flower bed in front of the cellar. It is the heirloom variety called Abe Lincoln. A very hardy plant.

This particular one got broken over by some kittens playing in the limbs. It still has lots of maters and this is one that I have saved some seed from. I like them really well for juice because they don't have a core to speak of.

They will have 3 or 4 lil green core like things but they are so small ya hardly notice them in there. A very meaty tomato with small seed and seed pockets.
Now there is ya a whole post of useless information. Not much else happening here today with the heat.
Although Rodger did get the tractor put back together and running and did some bush hogging this evening. The tractor water pump had gone out and broke the fan belt. So that was replaced along with the alternator that had not worked in a long time. So its all fit as a fiddle now.
So till next time, blessings from the McGuire homestead.

Stella