Christmas Jams

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I was attempting homemade Christmas presents this year. More specifically homemade jams and marmelades and macaroons.

Now according to Wiki: A macaroon (/mɑːˈkæ rʊŋ/ mah-kæ-rʊŋ ) is a type of light, baked confections, described as either small cakes or meringue-like cookies depending on their consistency. The original macaroon was a "small sweet cake consisting largely of ground almonds"^[1] similar to Italian or Moroccan amaretti.

My first macaroons were awful, they consisted almost solely of almonds and sunk into themselves if you touched them. My second go at them was a big improvement. I made them lemon and they really tasted like what I imagine lemon clouds would taste like- sugary lemon fluff, in case you are wondering.

The 2nd go at macaroons

The jams were also hit or miss. My first jam: Grapefruit Sesame was a breeze, my second: Fig berry a complete and utter failure, my third: Carrot Spice cake was quite good, and my fourth: Ashley's winter mix was something that I created myself and ended up being one of my favorites. It was mainly blackberry, red currants, a bit of apple, and gingerbread spice.

My winter jelly tasted the most "Christmasy" to me.

Here is a picture of the finished product. I was really pleased, and the hubby already finished a jar of each off so I know they did in fact taste good. I think I will do something similar next year and hopefully will have a bit more time to do the labels and packaging, as I feel like I could have done something much nicer- but I only had so much I could get done during nap times before Christmas!

Everyone got 3 jars of jam and 2 macaroons. They were supposed to get more of the cookies but after messing up once I didn't enough time to do more then one batch.