Carrot confiture. C'est ce bonne.

Almost anything serves to inspire me, when it comes to cooking. The Tzimmes dish by my friend Suggie, a carrot-fest in a pot with beef short ribs, got me thinking carrots - sweetened. The confiture seemed like a logical extension of that idea.

A ‘confiture’ is simply the French way of saying ‘jam’ or ‘preserves’. However, the process in making a confiture is considerably different from the way we normally make home-made jams - even the way I make them. Mainly, the difference is in jam making you will use some sort of pectin product to thicken the jam. In a confiture, the thickening is produced by cooking the sugar-fruit mixture ‘down’. It’s simpler and more straight forward, if you have more time on your hands. The cooking down process, in this case for example, takes about 30 minutes - after I cooked the carrots and the lemon/tangerine rind.

Here’s the drill:

Prep time: 15 minutes      Cooking time: First stage - 30 minutes   Second stage - 30 minutes

Makes 2 to 2-1/2 cups carrot confiture

You need: One medium deep pot with straight sides, and a heavy bottom to prevent burning and scorching.

Ingredients:

One medium sized bag of baby carrots, sliced into ‘coins’

2-1/2 cups sugar

1/2 cup honey

a pinch each salt and pepper

Rind of one each lemon and tangerine (or small orange) - sliced into thin ‘julienned’ slices

Julienne slice

Juice of 2 lemons

Juice of one tangerine or small orange

10 whole almonds, finely chopped

1/2 cup brandy

Carefully slice the colored part of the rind from both the lemon and tangerine (or orange). Julienne cut those slices into thin strips. Juice the lemons and tangerine (or orange). In a pan, combine the fresh juice and sugar with a pinch of salt and pepper. Over medium high heat, stirring frequently, cook until the sugar is completely dissolved and the citrus strips are looking cooked. This should take about 15 minutes. Don’t let it boil over or scorch.

While the citrus strips are cooking, boil/steam or microwave the carrots in plain water with a pinch or two of salt, until they are tender. Drain and then process in a food processor - using the pulse function - to a rough, small chunk stage. Don’t take it to a paste. Remove to a heavy bottomed pot. Pulse the nuts to a fine chop. Add to the pot. Add in the cooked citrus peel and sugar, the brandy and honey. Bring up the heat to medium high and boil - cooking about 10 minutes.  Reduce the heat as needed and cover, cooking until the liquid reduces and the carrots are looking glassy and ‘jammy’- which should take about 20 minutes more. Watch carefully for scorching on the bottom, stirring frequently.

When the liquid has completely reduced and you have a thick, lucious ‘jammy’ concoction, take it off the heat and store in glass jars in the refrigerator. Now you have a healthy and really low-sugar ‘jam’ to top your toast with, loaded with lovely carrot and nut goodness.

This rocks as a regular jam, but also in crepes, and as a condiment for fish, pork, lamb and poultry, or with crackers and cheese.

-maven

Roasted golden beet refrigerator pickles

As much as I love the pickled red beets, I prefer to use the new golden beets. I can toss in other colorful ingredients and it makes an absolutely gorgeous jar to give or to serve from.

As you can see, they made a nice nibble platter when paired with a melange of olives (which I served in some old BBQ oyster shells that I saved).

I took my original recipe from Alton Brown, but then made it my own with an array of spices that I keep handy. All I say, is that everybody raves about them, and they don’t last too very long. We went through an entire quart mason jar this evening with guests that inhaled them.

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