Nope, it's not honey from bees. This is "honey" as our elders made from sugar during the Depression, for my mom. Here's the recipe Manda proposed at the top of the thread. I just need some idea of how much rose water to use. Any ideas, anyone? Homemade Honey 10 cups white sugar 1 t alum 3 cups water 2 cups fireweed blossoms 1 cup red clover blossoms 2 1/2 cups white clover blossoms METHOD 1. In a large saucepan, bring water, sugar and alum to a boil and boil for 10 minutes. 2. Take off heat. 3. Rinse off blossoms in strainer and drain well (be sure not to leave any green parts on blossoms or honey will be wild or grassy tasting). 4. Stir in blossoms and steep for 3 hours. 5. Remove flowers, strain through cheesecloth if necessary. 6. Reheat to a boil, then pour into jars and seal. NOTES Variation: for a nice twist, try adding some fresh blackberries to the steeping process. It adds a wonderful flavor and a great color. Add approximately 1/3 cup of blackberries or other juicy fruit. Also be sure to squeeze the cheesecloth when you strain the honey to get all the juice and flavor from the berries. Makes 7 x 8 oz / 230 g jars. Time: 3 hours 20 minutes (3 hours preperation, 20 minutes cooking)

What I can't understand is why anyone would waste the time making or eating it. I think it is one of the old never-waste-anything recipes from pioneer days, an excuse to eat sugar water. Plus it is supposed to be made with old red cob field corn, not sweet corn cobs. Because all you are actually canning is flavored water. The instructions make it very clear that you cannot squeeze or press the cobs and must allow free, well-strained dripping only. In other words there is a high level of air and O2 exposure. Dave Here is a link that might be useful: Corn Cob jelly - NCHFP

Larry, I'll preface my comments by saying I am not at all a canning expert, and I am careful to use and follow safe, tested, approved canning recipes. I never "wing it" and just throw stuff together nor do I use old canning recipes that no longer meet current safety standards. I do not think that the idea of mixing peppers into purchased jelly would be advisable other than if you do it in very small batches that you keep refrigerated and eat within a few days. When we make a pepper jelly from scratch, the canning process makes the jelly safe to eat in several ways. When you are mixining peppers into a purchased jelly, while the jelly itself was safely canned, the peppers were not. Thus, the pathogens that cause potentially deadly diseases like botulism or listeria could grow in your pepper jelly after a few days in the refrigerator. You wouldn't see any visable signs, either, that potentially deadly diseases were lurking in your engineered pepper jelly because they are invisible. What you might see would be the growth of mold in the peppers, just as you would, for example, see mold grow in a jar of homemade jelly that failed to seal properly during the canning process. With the canning process we use when making jellies, one way that the food is preserved safely is that the high heat forces oxygen out of the jars and then the two-piece canning lids form a vacuum seal until opened, which keeps oxygen out. That provides the conditions that help prevent dangerous microorganisms from growing in the jars. In particular, with Habanero Gold jelly, the peppers and onions are first placed in a vinegar mixture which keeps them at a certain pH. That is important because the dangerous microorganisms cannot grow at that pH level. Maintaining exactly the right pH level when canning is very important and, if you added peppers to a previously canned commercial jelly, you don't have that vinegar there serving as the agent to maintain the proper pH. Maintaining the proper pH in the Habanero Gold jelly recipe is one factor that makes it safe. We have to have a specific amount of peppers/onions with a specific amount of vinegar. You cannot put in, for example, twice the hot peppers to make the jelly hotter unless you decrease the amount of sweet peppers in the recipe by the exact amount you increased the hot peppers. That way your total amount of peppers doesn't change so the pepper/onion to vinegar ratio remains as tested and approved. I also wonder this: even if it were safe to mix in chopped peppers into purchased jelly, would you get the same effect? When the pepper jelly ingredients are cooked together, it gives all the flavors a change to merge and blend together. I'm not sure you'd get the same effect from stirring in hot peppers into purchased jelly. By the time the two might have been mixed together long enough for the flavor to blend, then the two likely would be more than a few days old and no longer safe to eat. If you want to hear answers from the expert canners, I'd recommend you go visit the Harvest Forum here at Garden Web and get their answers to your question. The expert canners over there could explain it much more clearly and in much better detail than I did. Carol, I need to make some jelly! The more we talk about it, the more I want to make some. I hope the rainfall and cooler temps quiet things down around here for a while so I can spend more time at home in the kitchen. It rained again last night, almost an inch for us. Too bad it will freeze before the recent rainfall can help the garden produce anything else to can. I have babied about 120 lima bean plants throughout this long hot summer and am just a few days away from harvesting a monster crop. I hope covering up the lima bean plants on the two nights we'll be around 40 degrees will keep the beans maturing on schedule. I'm going to be really cranky if the beans don't get the chance to mature after all the water I poured into their giant container all summer, and after they hung on thru all those hot days and managed to survive until cooler weather arrived. Dawn

Gonzoe, I am so glad you liked the chowder! It is a great recipe . I had 2nds too ! As to the salad, I never have much luck with pasta salad until this one. I made a dressing that was really good...mine usually don't come out well but this one did so I will tell you what I did. I put about 1/2c red wine vinegar and a heaping Tbs Dijon mustard in the blender. I added a good pinch of salt and sugar and mixed that. I then added about 3/4c EVOO and buzzed again. I put a few splashes of Balsamic vinegar and also lemon juice to taste. For herbs I use Mrs dash Garlic mix sprinkled in. It was so good that I am not going to buy dressing anymore in the store. I just made it after reading several internet recipes. What about your salad was not good ? I bet we can fix it :) c