Annie: You, like me, seem to enjoy the challenge of doing something different, even if it's only the one time. ;-)

I haven't ever heard of an Autumn Olive. What is it? It sounds - and looks - as if it's a berry. Does it have the middle seed like an Olive?

westelle, I do like a challenge, but sometimes I just wonder about myself, LOL.

Autumn Olive has a pit, that's why I made jelly instead of jam. In fact, I think it's more pit than berry, although I just chewed the pit up and swallowed it, it's edible. Probably not pleasing texture in jam, though, so I strained 'em out.

It's an invasive import, planted by government agencies in their infinite wisdom, to combat erosion. Now you can't get rid of the darned things, they're everywhere. And they have thorns. And they choke out everything else. And you can't kill them. I hook a strap on them and pull them out, although I'm told that if I cut them and paint the stumps with poison ivy killer within two minutes, it "might" get rid of them. Most people, though, say they come right back the next year.

Annie

Here is a link that might be useful: Autumn Olive

Elaeagnus - we called it measles tree in my long long ago woody plants class. It was very invasive in NJ and present but less invasive in Maine. I know the berries are edible but never attempted to pick any quantity myself. I did attempt to make granita from choke cherries once. Similar in that they are teensy tiny cherries. I ended up mixing the cherries with blackberries and blueberries. Delicious but I did not get the full chokecherry experience....

Hi Annie -- I remember our conversation a while back about making autumn olive jam/jelly...... I'm *really* puzzled about the milky color of your juice after straining and the resulting color of your jelly.

When I made my AO jelly I simmered the berries with just a bit of water, crushing them in the pan as they softened. I strained everything by pressing the pulp through an ordinary wire-mesh strainer, then proceeded with adding sugar and boiling to the gel point from there. I used 3/4 cup sugar per cup of juice for the jelly and it was perfect -- not astringent at all. My resulting jelly contained the fine bits of fruit/skin that managed to pass through the strainer, so it wasn't a clear jelly, but it was a nice red color that was similar to the berry color. I loved it mixed w/ plain yogurt for a snack. :)

You can't measure the worth of a jam or jelly by how many hours it took -- you'd never make your own again. LOL!

Agmss, I've also made chokecherry jelly. Well, it didn't set, so it became chokecherry syrup, and was sweet enough that the girls liked it on pancakes. I've done elderberry jelly too, another small, time consuming berry to deal with, how do I decide I want to do that? (grin)

Party music, you're right. Readinglady's pear preserves takes 3 days, or parts of 3 days, and I love it, so it's worth it.

I understand from talking to the extension service that the Autumn Olive berries will taste different from bush to bush. I was advised that I should just keep tasting them until I found a bush I liked, some were more sweet than others would be.

So, I tasted and found the ones that tasted like cranberries, some tasted so bitter and horrible that I spit them out and some had little discernible flavor at all. No one could tell me why they were different in flavor, but it's conjectured that it could be the age of the bush, or the growing conditions, or just a trait of the variety. No one eats enough of them to really care enough to find out, I guess.

I still can't explain the pale reddish gold jelly from that milky white juice, though.

Maybe I should add some ghost peppers to a batch, now that would be interesting. Puckery astringent jam that burns your mouth, LOL.

Annie

This post was edited by annie1992 on Wed, Jan 8, 14 at 23:56