EASY-MADE STRAWBERRY JAM

                   

ONE WHO LOVES TO EAT CANNOT REAP THE FRUITS OF  INTERMITTENT FASTING?

A frustrated soul's realisation is that. I am doing it for over four years now. I remember I started with a 14 hours of intermittent fasting a few days before the son left home for his higher studies. I have seen others doing it too. When I compare the results, I see I did get some benefits but I continue to remain an overweight. I blame myself. Even after an eighteen hours of intermittent fasting, I should not eat more than just enough. I fail to draw the line most of the days. I end up having three chapatis instead of two, while the weight watchers would eat one. I have to pay the price. Last night, I tried roomali roti following chef Sanjot Kheer's video recipe, there had one extra dough ball. I thought let me have one extra chapati, I did and this morning my weight jumped to an excess of one kilogram. When I eat, I remain happy, I get upset once I stand on the weight machine the next day. The thing is how much I try a roomali roti, it does not get as thin as this variety of bread should be. I got nearer to it whilst making it for the man. While doing mine, I ended up cooking three normal chapatis because I am impatient, making a roomali roti requires a good amount of patience.

A roomali roti also requires practice. I did not follow the chef's instruction, I did not use milk for preparing the dough. The more I was stretching the sides of the roti, it was going back to the square. To roll a bread as thin as a paper / handkerchief is not just anyone's job. Our lunch yesterday was fish and rice.

THOUGH DISAPPOINTED ABOUT AN WEIGHT INCREASE, THERE WAS SOMETHING GOOD ABOUT THIS MORNING!

Our tiny plant rack arrived from the Shein Official. The only problem about online buy is that I lack the idea about the size, measurements though clearly mentioned. I do not wish to buy high end stuffs, will order more of them.

These small buys make me happy, let us see if it can take the weight or not.  My resolution of cutting the amount of food intake for the next few days was forgotten by the afternoon, look at my first meal.

What is the point doing an intermittent fasting if I eat all of that at one meal that we are supposed to have at three meals? But I cannot stop following this, it has controlled my blood sugar level, I am just unable to control my food cravings. I have nothing else to do except for cooking, eating and talking about my food-ventures! The weekend's excess food intakes are causing weight gain and the food stocked at home, else I came back  from the USA with a reduced weight even after eating out once a day and cooking well there. Here, you get food every hundred metres and there is no-one to monitor me.

WHAT IS THIS EASY-MADE STRAWBERRY JAM?

I had the best strawberry jam in a hotel in Shimla back in 2008. The boutique hotel was made of solid wood in the backdrop of a forest, they told the jam is made of the local produce and is organic. We grew up having homemade jam, jelly, pickle though a bottle of Kissan Mixed Fruit Jam was always there at home. We did not have much of bread, both of us siblings ate jams on the biscuits; tons of them we had but only Britannia Marie and Cream Cracker. The parents did not allow any other variety, they compensated with the abundance of Amul Butter, Kissan Mixed Fruit Jam and one day the mother herself started making Jam & Jelly. She would use guava, pineapple, mango. Did we know about strawberry then? I cannot even remember if our textbooks had pictures of strawberry in them or not. Once we re-located to Barrackpore, I saw strawberry at my university's friend Juthika's home. She had immense love for the terrace gardening, their terrace had the rarest of the flowering and fruiting plants she used to get from the Horticulture. Sharing a common interest, Juthika and our mother got closer, she used to visit our home even after my marriage. She had a late marriage and went to stay in the city of my birth. Her husband is a doctor there who my maternal uncles knew as they were wholesale medicine dealers, then I forgot his name, eventually lost all contacts with the quiet girl, she was supposed to meet our youngest maternal aunt, it did not happen I think. I would love to reconnect, our mother too forgot the bylane to Juthika's home, she was the younger of the two sisters. I remember her mother who was too quiet, their well designed big home, her father dying suddenly of diabetes and some of the secrets she shared with me. Now that my brother has renovated the home, I feel like going and staying for 2-3 days. The son too needs to go and stay, the man who also loved to go and stay in Barrackpore for few days doesn't even visit them, good old days. The mother stopped making jam & jelly once in Barrackpore. I keep making them for myself, one of my favourite food is having a toast with a layer of butter and then a layer of jam on it. I have forgotten the thin line of difference a spread, jam and preserve have; let me call this organic, vegan, gluten-free condiment an EASY-MADE STRAWBERRY JAM. One of my blogpost has that difference mentioned in details, I did read about it somewhere. 

Few other similar recipes in the Blog are APPLE GRAPE JAM, PEPPERY MANGO JAM, PEYARAR JELLY

                  

INGREDIENTS : 

FRESH STRAWBERRY : 250-300 GM 

SUGAR : 5-6 TBSP

LEMON JUICE : 3-4 TBSP

PROCEDURE :

Trust me, the recipe is as easy & simple as you see, that too using three ingredients.

Discard the green leafy section attached to the fruit, wash well rubbing the body of the fruits.

Chop each of the fruits and wash just once or you may not. I took them in a blender and blended coarsely wanting a jam like texture. If you want a preserve, do not blend the fruits.

I took the blended fruit and the sugar in a bowl and placed on the stove top. 

There is nothing much to do in this recipe but we cannot move from the kitchen, we are to constantly stir the mixture else it would burn from the bottom.

We have to discard the foam formed on the top, Once the mixture starts to turn darker, we would add the lemon juice. This would not let the mixture harden when cold.

We would keep stirring until the watery texture goes away. Any liquid residue may spoil the jam sooner.

I am loving it on my toasts, you would too.