London life has many bonuses for a young family, but when the riots kicked off on our front door step this week it was truly terrifying. I don’t need to tell you what a battering Ealing took as it was broadcast for all the world to see. But I can tell you it’s incredibly shocking seeing your local shops get smashed, looted and burnt.
It’s hard to describe how I felt shaking under the duvet at 2am hearing people shouting and banging in our road wondering if they were going to start smashing up our cars, or worse our houses.
So the next day, as a way of escaping the horrible atmosphere I whisked the boys away fruit picking at Copas Farm Iver, then onto Black Park for lots of running around in the woods.
Sam and his friends a world away from London madness
We then returned home, hosed down the ice-cream and fruit coated boys and tucked them up in bed. Would there be more trouble on our streets? Instead of winding myself up by watching rolling news I decided to make jam instead.
Lovely vibrant summery raspberry jam – my absolute favourite. We’d picked 2.1kg of rasps which made a whopping 16 jars of jam. You can never have too many in my book.
You can find the recipe and step-by-step instructions in my first ever jam post from last year – this is particularly useful if you’ve never made jam before and don’t know where to start.
It’s now one of my most-loved things to do in the kitchen. It’s one of those skills that’s been passed down through the generations and has changed very little, if at all. Wonderful.
Get yourself to a pick your own farm and see what fruit you can find – there’s nothing like the flavour you get from freshly picked fruit made straight into jam. It’s also a brilliant way to fill a day of the school holidays. Arlo and Sam had a blast running up and down the rows of fruit and veg with their friends, picking whatever they wanted.
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I’m entering this post into Ren at Fabulicious Food‘s new blog event Simple and in Season which aims to showcase as many recipes as possible making the most of the fruit and veg at it’s best right now!
Lovely! I was wondering where we could do PYO. We used to do it growing up in Cornwall but I havent looked for anywhere near London. We shall pay them a visit. I have recently got into jam making as well – a hobby the kids approve of!
Jam making rules – they have plums at Iver too which make delicious jam 🙂
Glad you are all safe xx
Glad you could do something nice to escape the horrible riots. My friend made plum jam the other day, so this has made me want to try making some!
PS. What pretty jars!
Thanks Holly – you should def give jam making a go it’s so satisfying! I’ve gone a bit jam crazy and made a batch of plum jam too so am now very well stocked!!!!