Table Of ContentCopyright © 2008, 2010 by Pam Corbin
Photographs copyright © 2008 by Gavin Kingcome
Additional photography copyright © 2008 by Lois Wakeman
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of the Crown Publishing
Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com
www.tenspeed.com
Ten Speed Press and the Ten Speed Press colophon are registered trademarks of Random
House, Inc.
Originally published in slightly di�erent form in Great Britain by Bloomsbury Publishing
Plc, London, in 2008
Grateful acknowledgment is made to Harper Collins Publishers Ltd. to reprint the beech
leaf noyau recipe from Food for Free. Copyright © 1972 by Richard Mabey. Reprinted by
permission.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on �le with the publisher.
Corbin, Pam.
River Cottage preserves handbook / Pam Corbin ; introduction by Hugh Fearnley-
Whittingstall. — 1st U.S. ed.
p. cm.
Includes index.
1. Cookery (Jam) 2. Condiments. 3. Chutney. 4. River Cottage (Television program) I. Title.
TX814.5.J35C67 2010
641.6'382—dc22
2010010617
eISBN: 978-1-60774-082-7
Project editor: Janet Illsley
v3.1
for my daughters, Pip and Maddy
Contents
Introduction
Seasonality
The Rules
Jams & Jellies
Pickles, Chutneys & Relishes
Cordials, Fruit Liqueurs & Vinegars
Canned Fruits
Sauces, Ketchups & Oil-based Preserves
Notes to the U.S. Edition
Acknowledgments
Index
I love jam and all its jarred and bottled relatives, the
extended family we call by the rather austere name
preserves. Actually, they’re not austere at all. They are
warm, forward, and friendly, o�ering up both generous
feisty �avors and intriguing spicy subtleties to all who
embrace them.
Mostly, I love them for being so delicious. But I also
cherish and admire them for something else. They
epitomize the values at the heart of a well-run, contented
kitchen. Firstly, they embody and thrive on seasonal
abundance. Secondly, they are, or should be, intrinsically
local, perfectly complementing the grow-your-own (or at
least pick-your-own) philosophy. And thirdly, not to be
sni�ed at in these days of ecological anxiety, they are
frugal, thrifty and parsimonious: they waste not, so we
want not.
Jams, chutneys, and pickles embrace the seasons, but
they also, in an elegant and entirely positive manner, defy
them. They do so by stretching the bounty of more
abundant months into the sparser ones. We shouldn’t
underestimate this achievement. Over the centuries,
wizards and alchemists have used all the power and magic
they can muster to try and catch rainbows, spin straw into
gold, and even bring the dead back to life. They’ve failed,
of course. Yet all the while, humble peasants and ordinary
housewives have got on with the simple business of
bottling sunshine so that it may spread a little joy in the
leaner seasons…They call it jam.
More prosaically, I love the way that a couple of hours in
the kitchen transforms a gardener’s problem into a cook’s
delight. Come August and September, when it starts raining
plums and you are wading through thigh-sized summer
squash, your conscience would be rightly pricked if you
threw such bounty on the compost heap. But when you
know how to preserve your own fruit and vegetables, a glut
of apples or a pile of pears becomes an exciting
opportunity rather than a headache.
Yet I know many keen cooks, even some gardener cooks,
who never make preserves. They love eating them, they
love receiving them as gifts, they love the idea of making
them, but something is holding them back. What is it? A
fear, perhaps, of the perceived paraphernalia of jam
making, a mild hysteria about the dangers of boiling sugar,
a rumbling anxiety about the setting point. I know that
such worries are unfounded — delusional even. So what
can I do for these poor souls?
Well, I can introduce them to Pam Corbin. I �rst heard
about “Pam the Jam” when she was running Thursday
Cottage Preserves, a small commercial jam company that
operated in an almost domestic way, making old-fashioned
preserves the old-fashioned way, with real ingredients.
When we started planning our Preserving Days at River
Cottage, I knew Pam was the person for the job. She shares
her passion and wealth of knowledge with enviable clarity
and enthusiasm. Many of her sentences end with “it’s
simple, really,” and with Pam to guide you, you really
believe it is.
As this book has come together, my admiration for Pam
has deepened. She is a great communicator who bestows
infectious con�dence on her charges. But more than that,
she is a woman of decisive palate and impeccable good
taste. Throughout the growing year that it took to produce
this book, I was the lucky recipient of regular “jamograms”
— little parcels of tasting pots of recipes that she was
developing for the book.
From her early rhubarb jam to roasted sweet beet relish,
and from apple lemon curd to roasted tomato ketchup, they
were invariably exquisite. Your ambitions may be as
modest as a few jars of perfect strawberry jam, but I’m
quite con�dent that under Pam’s guidance you will soon be
dabbling with blackberry and apple leather, nasturtium
“capers,” �ggy mostardo, and elixir of sage. Just writing
their names makes me hungry.
Sadly, there wasn’t room for all of Pam’s fabulous recipes
in this book. But it is a tribute to her remarkable gifts that
every time we decided to leave one out, it felt like a minor
tragedy. The upside is that every recipe that’s in here is a
tried-and-trusted gem. They met with universal approval
from the River Cottage tasting panel — not a formal body,
you understand, but a dangerous scrummage of whoever
was around when Pam dropped by with a few more jars or
bottles.
Pam’s approach is not didactic, but encouraging and
adventurous. Her message is that, once you’ve mastered a
few basic techniques, there’s really no stopping you. In this
inspiring book, she will show you the ropes and then give
you the reins. I’m absolutely sure you will enjoy the ride.
Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Dorset, May 2008
