Rowan, can I?

It's probably the last week in November, two close friends safely were married two weeks earlier. I'm home alone so I root around in the freezer to discover the Rowan Berries that we foraged in summer time. Maybe making these into something edible might just go to show the importance of this thing that we do.

I never realised you could use Rowan Berries for food, but careful reading of a borrowed foraging book proves that you can and so we had foraged a fair amount in late summer.

I've got hold of about 150 grams of Rowan Berries, leaving plenty on the trees for the birds to chomp on, and boiled them up in some water- just enough to cover the berries, with the juice of a lemon and three tablespoons of Brown Sugar. All these ingredients were then, once the berries had absorbed all the water, mashed up into a paste, mixed with around ten Rosemary Leaves and put in an airtight jar. 

When everything had cooled down enough inside the jar, I put the jar of jelly in the fridge and left it there until the first weekend in January after New Year's Day. 

Saturday 8 January 2022, early lunch taken. The rain had washed out the morning walk, the phone had rung a bit but one important message was still finding its way through cyberspace. It was time to take a pause, reflect, plan, and have cheese and biscuits to which this Jelly was the perfect accompaniment. 

I opened the jar and tilted it slightly. The jelly moved slightly and in a way that confirmed it had reached that perfect medium between liquidity and solidness just as all good jelly should. 

The music on the player to which I would enjoy this sophisticated meal to was Joan Armatrading's first album, 1972's "Whatever's for Us". The sentiment in the title was appropriate to the moment. The record stands as one of the finest debuts of the whole singer-songwriter movement and is up there with James Taylor's first album in that respect. It's produced by Gus Dudgeon and some of his touches with the piano, string and vocal arrangements hint at early period Elton, but the overall sound Armatrading creates is unique and wonderful on the record's 14 superior songs. Each is just the right length and none outstay their welcome.

The Rowan Jelly was served with some Cheese and Almond Biscuits and a couple of slices of Double Gloucester with chives. The Jelly's taste was a little like a richer yet slighter bitter version of Cranberry Sauce. It certainly needed the Brown Sugar to counterbalance the Rowan Berries' and Lemon Juice's very sharp flavour. The Rosemary meanwhile added a lovely sweet and sour tang to it all. 

To be sure the Jelly is set, you're best leaving a gap between making it and storing it of around six weeks prior to using it. Once you've first used it, then it should be good to use for a month before it's fully consumed. 

Dark yet glowing, the Jelly is very flavoursome if served with Cheese and Biscuits