Redcurrant and chilli jam

My holidays are over and I have returned home. Of course it's a shame not to see fascinating places all the time, but it's kind of good to be here again to my usual routine. I can't wait for the autumn to begin either, as it's somehow such a cosy season. I'm sure there will be a few holiday posts still, but at least I'm now able to cook in my own kitchen again.

I love redcurrants for their sharp taste, and now I got some fresh ones after a long while (haven't really had them in large quantities for years). A cake, a pie or anything sweet would've been the natural choice to make from them, but this time I went with something different.

I found this redcurrant and chilli jam recipe in a Finnish magazine and I pretty much followed it. The only thing was that I added vegetarian gelatine to it, as my jam didn't set without it. I guess Finnish redcurrants have that much more pectin, so that the jam sets without gelatine or extra added pectin. 

Ingredients

10 small dried red chillies (in the original recipe: 5 red chillies)

2 shallots

2 garlic cloves

200 g redcurrants (original recipe used frozen ones)

2 dl white wine vinegar

1 dl water

2 tbsp ground ginger

4 dl sugar

2 tsp salt

2 tbsp vegetarian gelatine

Method

Chop the chillies, shallots and garlic finely. I left the seeds in the chillies as I used my own harvested and dried chillies, but if you don't want a very spice jam, remove the seeds then. My chillies are really very small, so the quantity might sound like a lot.

Put all ingredients into a saucepan and boil it through for a few minutes. Then let the mix simmer at lower heat for about 30 minutes. The original recipe says that the mix is fairly liquid at that point, however I would recommend adding a little vegetarian gelatine, if you want a firm jam.

Let the mix cool a little and then put it into jars and store in a cool place. Serve this jam with hearty cheese sticks, vegetarian burgers, roasted potatoes, whatever you would like!

Your VegHog