This has been an incredible year for fruit in Northern New Mexico, and if you're like me, you can't stand to see the gifts of summer gone in a blink.

The easiest and most satisfying way to store up summer is to make it into jam. In the dead of winter, when the only fruit you'll find is old and tired — or picked green and shipped from South America — your shelves will be lined with glistening, jewel-colored jams. Homemade jam is great on an open-faced nut-butter sandwich for breakfast or lunch, and whether drizzled over ice cream, baked into a cookie or cake, or eaten off the spoon, jam is fabulous any time — and it's simple to make.

In a growing season as marginal as ours in Northern New Mexico, bountiful fruit years are rare. Typically, an unusually warm period in the spring stimulates the fruit trees into bud, then a killing frost strikes on a beautiful May night. The nascent buds turn brown, and our hopes for that year's harvest die. We consider ourselves lucky if we get stone fruit (peaches, nectarines, cherries) every other year. Sometimes we go through a bad stretch and can go several years without getting a decent crop.

This year, not everyone has been lucky; patches of trees have frozen here and there. Few trees produced apricots this year, and their locations, it seems, are a closely guarded secret. Apricot trees are as common in Santa Fe as lilacs are, which also have their good and bad years, but this year there are no sidewalks plastered with apricot mush alive with feasting flies and bees. In the years that we do have an apricot crop, many locals have a favorite tree they know they can pick at a church yard, in a lawyer's garden or on a vacant lot.

Despite the unpredictable nature of our fruit crops, we're incredibly lucky in other ways. Dry-land fruit is considered very desirable; the flavor of the typically smaller fruits and their tang are intensified by stress and concentrated by lack of water. Here, even if we irrigate, the intensity of the sun and the aridity still makes our fruit taste like dry-land fruit.

To take advantage of our naturally more flavorful fruit, buy from the farmers markets or cruise U.S. 285 north toward Taos on a fruit quest. Stop along the way in Velarde or Dixon and buy some fruit at a stand after tasting the offerings. In fact, local farmers were selling peaches in the Walmart parking lot in Española recently, so look for hand-lettered signs along the road, too. Don't buy supermarket fruit to make jam, because it just won't be as good.

For the best jam results, use tree-ripened fruit that's just at the beginning of full ripeness; discard any fruits that aren't firm or are leaking. Include some slightly under-ripe fruit to add pectin and tartness, and be sure to cut out any bad spots or bruises.

As a general rule of thumb, fruits with acidity make the best jams. Choice of fruit depends, of course, on what's available and on personal taste, but here are some guidelines:

• For a smooth, voluptuous jam that doesn't challenge but gives the sweetness we so rightly deserve, make a peach jam.

• Do you like something that's sweet-tart and challenging, waking up your drowsy mood with an attention-getting tang? Wild plum (or Redcloud plum) jam will do it.

• Would you like a mixture of smooth, soft fruit with some well-defined pieces, the best of smooth and tangy? Try honeyed pears.

Jam-making isn't hard, but it can be intimidating for those who aren't of the canning persuasion. Just take heart and follow the directions.

Here are a few delicious and easy recipes. Once you make them, you'll wonder why you haven't been making jam every summer. Then you'll remember — this is an incredible fruit year, so celebrate the bounty while there's still time.

USDA home-canning guidelines and instructions are available at www.foodsaving.com/G7Preparing-CanningJams-Jellies.pdf and www.uga.edu/nchfp/publications/publications_usda.html.

Special equipment: a stainless-steel or enamel stew pot; canning jars with lids and screw bands; a candy thermometer. Optional but helpful: a ladle, a funnel and a jar grabber.


2 packets low-sugar-recipe fruit pectin powder (Sure-Gel)
14 cups large chopped peaches, skin-on
4 two-inch cinnamon sticks
1/2-cup fresh-squeezed lemon juice
9 cups sugar, divided
1 teaspoon butter, optional, to keep the foam down

Prepare jelly jars and lids according to USDA guidelines.

Put a small plate in the freezer. Mix Sure-Gel with 1/2 cup sugar and set aside. Combine peaches, cinnamon sticks, lemon juice and remainder of sugar in a large stainless or enamel pot and bring to a boil, stirring frequently. Add butter. Place on a flame tender or turn the flame to low. Continue to stir frequently until mixture comes to a rolling boil that won't stir down, and boil one minute. Add pectin and sugar mixture and bring to a rolling boil again. The liquid in the mixture should look glossy and thicker. Test mixture by putting a small spoonful of it on the frozen plate. Put the plate back in the freezer for one minute. It should look gelled when you pull a finger through it. Remove the cinnamon sticks from the jam and cut them into 9 pieces. Add one piece of cinnamon stick to each jar. Ladle jam into sterilized jars and seal according to USDA guidelines.


2 packets low-sugar recipe Sure-Gel
16 cups chopped, unpeeled white peaches
1/3 cup lime juice
2 vanilla beans
1/3 cup Prosecco (or white wine)
8 1/2 cups sugar, divided
1 teaspoon butter

Prepare jelly jars and lids according to USDA guidelines. Put a small plate in the freezer. Mix pectin and 1/2-cup sugar and set aside. Combine peaches, lime juice, vanilla beans, Prosecco and eight cups sugar in a stainless or enamel pot. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently. Add butter. Place on a flame tender or turn the flame to low. Continue to stir frequently until mixture comes to a rolling boil that won't stir down, and boil one minute. Add pectin mixture and bring to a rolling boil again. The liquid in the mixture should look glossy and thicker. Test mixture by putting a small spoonful of it on the frozen plate, and put the plate back in the freezer for one minute. It should look gelled when you pull a finger through it. Ladle jam into sterilized jars and seal according to USDA Guidelines.


Wild plums (sand plums) grow all over Northern New Mexico. If you have a friend who has a farm, ask if there's a wild plum tree you can pick. They're also sometimes for sale at the Santa Fe Farmers Market. This is a recipe with directions for the old, European style of sealing the jam jars. It is not recommended by the USDA. Follow the directions on the Web sites listed before the recipe section, and use a hot-water bath to finish the canning process.


3 1/2 pounds wild plums, rinsed well
5 1/2 cups sugar, divided (the plums are very tart, so they do need this much sugar)
1 package regular pectin
1 teaspoon butter

Prepare jelly jars and lids according to USDA guidelines. Put a small plate in the freezer. Cook whole plums in a stainless or enamel pot with a little water until they disintegrate enough to pick out the pits. When all the pits are removed, measure the pulp and put it back in the pot. It should make about 31/2 cups of pulp. Add sugar, pectin and butter. Bring to a rolling boil, cook for one minute, and then ladle into hot, sterilized jars. Tighten lids finger-tight, and then invert jars. Let rest for 15 minutes, and then turn jars right side up. Let rest until perfectly cool. Lids should make a popping sound as they seal. If they do not seal, refrigerate and use right away.


1 cup crushed canned pineapple
8 cups cored and chopped pears
5 cups sugar
Juice of one lemon
1 teaspoon ginger
1/2 cup water

Prepare jelly jars and lids according to USDA guidelines.

Mix all ingredients together and stir continually until desired thickness (about 20 minutes after it comes to a high boil). Can according to USDA Guidelines.