Autumn Olive 101

For those of you wondering what an autumn olive is (after Mom mentioned them in a recent post), I must say that we learned of them only a few years ago when some of the little children in our church decided to explore our woods one Sunday. They came back carrying boughs full of tiny red fruits and were stuffing their mouths. We asked them what they were, and the reply was "autumn olives!" I guess they knew what they were talking about!

Well, since then several of the trees have sprouted up on our property (they're actually considered an invasive species in this area), and around this time of year they are brimming with red fruit. You can spot an autumn olive tree by its silvery green foliage and usually long, hanging branches. Deer and birds supposedly love their berries. They are a nice tart treat if you don't mind the edible but tough seed in the middle. Seeing all the fruit loading each tree, it seems a shame to just let them drop to the ground each year. A couple of days ago I took a break from business course studies and went out to do some picking--and realized the trees were more plentiful than I'd thought. The deer had discovered them, too, because the ground had been flattened.

I did a Google search on recipes for autumn olive jelly and didn't end up with very much that was helpful. This web page had all the information you'd ever want to know about autumn olives, except a recipe. It was interesting to find out that the fruits are high in Vitamin C and contain about 17 times more lycopene (a cancer-fighting agent) than tomatoes.

I also checked out a library book titled Wild Preserves which had instructions on just about every woodland fruit there is, except autumn olives. So after following what the book said about testing for natural pectin (if I did it right), I found that autumn olives are relatively low in pectin. So I decided to improvise from a jam recipe for blackberries, since they seemed similar in that respect. Having never made any kind of jam or jelly, I didn't really know what I was doing but figured it was worth a try! Any of you jelly-making experts out there could probably tweak the recipe I used to make it better. From what I've read you aren't supposed to alter the amounts of a recipe at all or it won't set up like it should, so I'm surprised my version turned out the way it did--it seemed to gel up alright, though one batch was better than the other. I made 18 8-oz. jars in all.

Now after trying the jam and some juice I made from the pulp, Mom asked what else we could make from them. I'll have to think on that! Any ideas?

~Hannah

(Click continue reading for recipe)

Hannah's Autumn Olive Jam   ~makes 8 cups

8 cups autumn olives, stemmed

1/2 cup water

7 cups sugar

3 oz. liquid pectin, i.e. Certo (requires more sugar than the powdered pectin: I'll have to experiment more...)

Pick more fruit than you think you'll need, because it will take forever to take all the stems out of every tiny berry (trust me). It would be better to sort them and just use the riper ones that the stems have already fallen off. I guess you could just cook them with the stems on because you'll be straining out the seeds anyway, but I didn't try this.

Cook the fruit and water in a large stainless steel pot on high/med for about 5 minutes, while crushing with a potato masher until most of the fruit has been crushed and seeds are extracted. Remove from heat and pour through a sieve or put through a food mill to strain out the seeds. 8 cups of fruit will come to exactly 4 cups of pulp.

Measure 4 cups pulp and return to saucepan, adding 7 cups sugar. Add 1/2 tsp. butter, if desired, to help reduce foam. Bring to a full rolling boil, stirring constantly. Quickly stir in the liquid pectin and boil for exactly 1 minute longer. Remove from heat and skim off any foam (I didn't need to).

Ladle quickly into hot sterilized jars, filling to within 1/8" of the tops. Wipe rims and screw lids tightly. Process in boiling water canner for 10 min or use inversion method.

Comments

[Bet]

Wow. You've been busy, Hannah!

What do the autumn olives taste like? What does the jelly taste like or did you try any yet?

[milgwimper]

WOW that is facinating! I have never heard of autmn olives! Now I really want to try them! :9

[milgwimper]

Here is a link that has a recipe for making wine.

http://invasivespecies.blogspot.com/2002_09_08_invasivespecies_archive.html

[hannah]

It's hard to say what they taste like--maybe a little like grapes, but a lot more tart. We haven't opened a jar yet, but we did scrape the bowl. :)

Milgwimper, thanks for the link to that blog--I had tried that site, but when I clicked on the link for jelly, it wouldn't come up. I'm not sure whether autumn olives grow in California, though.

[milgwimper]

Hannah.

Hmm Im sorry the link did not work. Maybe I mis typed it or they are down. Anyways, I have been thinking about those autmn olived every since you mentioned them! :D Thet say the blossoms are fragrant. Can you describe what they smell like? I am so intrigued by this plant! Thank you in advance!

[Hannah]

milgwimper-- In the spring there are lots of white blossoms that fall to the ground. I'm actually not sure what they smell like, but they do have a strong fragrance.

That's alright about the link; it was the jelly one that didn't work for me.