Jackfruit Jam

The act of putting into your mouth what the earth has grown is perhaps your most direct interaction with the earth- Frances Moore Lappe

It's that time of the year when mom frantically searches for ideas to preserve jackfruit. She gives it away to our neighbours, packs and sends some to us in ripe and raw form, and throws away the rest. It's amazing how exotic this fruit is outside Kerala. I am often flummoxed watching people crowding around jackfruit sellers at road side or at the excitement on the faces of people when they see jackfruit in neatly package boxes. But to me the real way to have jackfruit is to clean it all by yourself. And I love watching the whole family oiling their palms and getting at the task sitting huddled around the jackfruit and gossiping about the happenings in town. This time mom came down with two ripe jackfruits and my hubby and bro-in- law dutifully  cleaned and sorted the seeds and fruit. We were left with nearly 3.5 kg of over ripe jackfruit and so we decided to preserve it in the best form we could. 

Ingredients for Jackfruit Jam

Ripe Jackfruit chopped- 900 g

Sugar- 200 g

Directions

Chop the jack fruit finely. Pressure cook the jack fruit with sugar up to one whistle, this fastens the process. Now open the lid and cook the jam for 30 minutes till the water content evaporate completely and you are left with a sticky mixture.You could use brown sugar or jaggery, this will give a different flavor and colour to the jam. We have this jam in store to prepare tea time snacks like ada. It can also be consumed with bread, rotis and just like that as a dessert. If you like spices add 2 cloves and 1 stick cinnamon to the jam for flavour.

We made this jam which is a slightly different variant of the traditional chakka varatiyathu. I did not use any preservatives but some recipes suggest using citric acid. Mom and I did not use the entire 3.5 jg for jam so we have few other surprises waiting round the corner. Stay tuned.