A lot of crying!

It seemed like a good idea to make onion marmalade, until I remembered I can only slice two onions before my eyes stream and my nose runs! I dug out my little food processer which has a slicing blade and cut down the time considerably, but there was still a lot of nose blowing, eye mopping and sniffing before the 2kgs of onions were ready for the pot. No gain without pain - I hope it tastes good after all that. It looks decidedly amateur in my motley collection of jars and lacks the shabby chic of the Country Living look. They are the last six remaining and I even had to evict half a jar of jam into a plastic tub to get those.

I found the recipe in this little book on Preserves - one of the titles in the River Cottage Handbook series. I have already made the Hedgerow Jelly using sloes and crabapples and want to make Sloe Gin next. My sloes are in the freezer as it is recommended that they be frosted before use. Leaving them on the tree is risky as the birds could well have eaten them all before we get any frost.

Apologies for the rather blurred photo - the book has a very textured cover which prevents a clear sharp image. That's my excuse anyway. Pam Corbin is the author and the book is full of useful information, interesting recipes for flavoured vinegars and oils, and as well as the better known ones for preserving vegetables and fruits there are also some quite unusual ones. I walked past a tree today absolutely laden with rowan berries and thought 'I wonder what they'd taste like'.

I must pick some more blackberries - we've already eaten those we picked a couple of weeks ago. They will have to sit in the freezer till I can use them as I've run out of jam jars and shelf space in the larder. I love blackberry and apple jam and my husband loves blackberry and apple crumble so I shall need several pounds to keep us both happy until next year.