Jam & Conserves

Sometimes, more really is better.

Unctuous, this preserves is nectarine pieces (either certified organic from CA or from New York's Hudson Valley) macerated with honey and Meyer lemon zest, then cooked with organic figs, lemon juice, and star anise until just before the preserve sets. Then the star anise blades come out and the rum goes in.

This conserve has huge flavor. The last thing you taste is the zing of the aromatic Meyer lemon zest, which ties it all together.

This honey sweetened conserve contains: certified organic/IPM grown nectarines, honey, dried organic figs, lemon juice, rum, organic star anise, meyer lemon zest.

Apricot preserves are one of the most versatile fruit preserves ever. I substitute this apricot jam for the honey in my Bees Knees cocktails. But apricots go with fish, meat, cheese, baking projects, toast AND should always be balanced enough in flavor to eat straight from the jar for instant sweet fixes.

Apricot Jam is a traditional pairing for washed rind cheeses.

Ingredients: organic apricots or Hudson Valley (NY) apricots, honey, lemon juice.

Apricots cooked with a small amount of honey (allowing the tart character of the apricot to show through) and urfa biber chili pepper. Urfa Biber peppers are grown in Turkey and slowly dried under the sun to bring out a smoky and fruity flavor that is great with fruit. This has a mild heat.

In the spring, V Smiley Preserves uses organic west coast apricots and later in the summer, NY grown apricots.

This honey sweetened jam contains: apricots, honey, lemon juice, urfa biber pepper.

The evolution of the elderflower into elderberries is the most simultaneously sensible and magical of transformations.

A jam that leans savory with the peppy grapefruit and piquant white peppercorn, this flavor is perfect for morning toast especially if it involves a fried egg and some avocado.

This jam would also be perfect for lamb, beef and game roasts.

For Cheese, start with blue cheese but try it with hard raw milk cheeses and even cheddar is delightful too! 

Ingredients: elderberries, gooseberry, honey, lemon juice, grapefruit rind, white peppercorn

Quince, apple, honey, vanilla bean, spices, brandy

Comfort + joy!

An apricot forward preserve with the yarrow nosing up the tangy qualities of fruit. The elderflower is a background flavor giving roundness to the peppery yarrow flavor.

This is my favorite flavor to come out of the 2018 season of flavor experiments. It’s elegant, light, and approachable in flavor; beautiful with fresh bloomy rind cheeses and makes a wonderful cocktail mixer.

I have been wanting to make a flavor with yarrow for years. As a child enthralled by herbal medicine, I quickly learned that yarrow helps with so many ailments. I didn’t realize for another decade, that yarrow grew in so many colors.

In our herb gardens, yarrow is almost an invasive as it readily spreads in our sandy soil.

This honey sweetened jam is made with: apricot, plum, honey, lemon juice, yarrow, elderflowers.

Somehow the Aronia berry helped create the most plummy plum jam—lots of body, warmth, textural heft and a kiss of tartness.

Greengages are still relatively unusual to find in Vermont. If you know, you know that they are one of the sweetest plums, defying their green color, which might have you thinking of “sour” or “tough”, but in fact Greengages are ambrosial. The Aronia berry plays a supporting role of color and pectin and a counterbalance of acidity to the Greengage’s sweetness.

This flavor is very limited. Plum harvests differ year to year with varieties variably flagging and/or succeeding season to season depending on summer storms and spring rains. The yellow jackets in particular love Greengages so we feel really lucky to have gotten a harvest.

Ingredients: honey, aronia berry, greengage plum, lemon juice

Our cooler temps seasonal flavor with Plain Goods is Apple Butter. Is there a more classic autumnal preserve? This year we made our apple butter with Dolgo Crabapples, Ashmead Kernel and Honeycrisp Apples from Addison County Vermont while taking a Masala Chai approach to spicing the fruit butter with the addition of a dash of white pepper. Combined with whole vanilla beans, the aromatic mix is “comfort with pep”.

There are multiple approaches to making fruit butter. Traditionally, butters are minimally sweetened and use less added sugars. We take a light touch with the honey (apples can be so sweet just on their own!) and cook our butters quickly like our jams. This maintains the juicy, fresh fruit flavor and keeps the honey and/or sugar flavor from taking over.

This apple butter contains: apple, honey, lemon juice, vanilla bean, ceylon cinnamon, clove, allspice, white pepper, nutmeg.

A childhood favorite, I love raspberry jam. I demand that it’s tangy, sweet, luscious (slightly soft set) and always made with either unsprayed local raspberries or certified organic berries.

I do three things with raspberry jam; eat it straight from the jar, swirl it into yogurt or get out the peanut butter jar. Occasionally when I’m craving sweets in the morning, I’ll bake some almond flour muffins filled with jam.

This honey sweetened jam contains: raspberries, honey, lemon juice.

A lot of fruit combinations are lovely, but raspberries and currants together are exceptional. I collect raspberries and Redcurrants all summer from places like The Farm Between, our farm and loads of berries from Omar Fugaro's farm on E. Munger St. in Middlebury (the next town over from here). A light infusion of scented rose geranium (grown in our gardens) at the end ignites this flavor into something heady, something special. 

This jam is especially good with fresh goat cheese and in baking projects.

A Good Food Award Winner.

This honey sweetened jam contains: redcurrants, honey, raspberry, lemon juice, rose geranium.

Tangy and sweet with Munstead, Phenemonal, and Elegance lavender blossoms folded into the jam.

This flavors lives fully in the traditional jam flavor category (brambly, tart, sweet, homey) so it makes a great gift and it’s going to be very at home on your toast with ricotta or just some salty cultured butter. For cheese pairing, try it with an ash-veined goat milk cheese.

This honey sweetened jam contains: honey, blackberry, rhubarb, lemon juice, lavender.

A truly balanced, fruity cherry jam. This jam lives on the sweeter end of the V Smiley Preserves flavor spectrum, which is to say, far less sweet than commercial jam, but sweet enough to always be a best-seller. It's a crowd pleaser and the hibiscus and rosehips keep it real, spotlighting the tart & juicy side of the cherry character.

An all-rounder for eating with cheese, this jam pairs with bloomy rinds (Brie) to alpine styles and washed rinds.

This honey sweetened jam contains: cherries, honey, lemon juice, almond extract, dried organic rosehips, dried organic hibiscus (the existing label says this jam contains apple, but we stopped using apple in the recipe).

Toast's best friend. I call this jam the sleeper amongst the collection of preserves. Eaten off the spoon, you think, yes, tastes bright with lemon and blueberry, slightly tannic from the superfood Aronia Berry (from Sayre Fields in Hinesburg) and sweetly aromatic with vanilla bean. Then you put it on crepes, pancakes and any other food where you also break out the salted butter and this sleeper turns into a star. 

Out of the jar, this preserve behaves like a jelly on the spoon. Blueberries and Aronia are loaded with pectin so they make for a stiff set. The preserve spreads like a jam.

This honey sweetened jam contains: wild/organic blueberries, honey, lemon juice, organic aronia berry, vanilla extract/bean. 

Blackcurrants are magic; that tartness and cassis musk. The New York Shiro Plums let the blackcurrants be the star of this flavor, but the plums contribute enormously to the texture, making sure the jam is not overwhelmed by the seed and skin of the blackcurrant.

Eat this with rich fish like roasted tinned sardines or fresh black cod. Baste roast chicken with pan juices and jam. Assemble a salad of roasted and fresh veggies atop a shmear of Blackcurrant Plum Jam. Spoon this tart, purple preserve into banana smoothies. This flavor belongs everywhere, from morning oatmeal and yogurt bowls to gin cocktails. For cheese pairing, try a blue!

This honey sweetened jam contains: shiro plum, honey, blackcurrant, lemon juice.

A favorite from my start in Seattle. A surprising delight for yogurt. Blackberries are dreamy.

Excellent with fresh goat cheese!

This honey sweetened jam contains: fresh plums, honey, blackberries, lemon juice, lemon basil.

A customer favorite, this savory leaning jam is complex and surprising.

Cherry Sherry Fennel Jam can temper super sweet bakes and tame intense vegetables. It gets along with nearly every cheese type.

Eat this with mustard and prosciutto, roasted ham, sheep's milk cheese, roast beef sandwiches with lots of mustard, or use it as a sauce with labneh for roasted brussels sprouts or any brassica like roasted cabbage, rapini, cauliflower, etc.

This honey sweetened jam contains: sour cherries, honey, apples, lemon juice, pedro ximenez sherry vinegar, orange zest, toasted fennel seed.