A few years ago (I really have no idea how many, three? four? five maybe?), I abandoned the practice of eating lunch out. I used to eat out five days a week, but it got to the point that I could no longer afford to do so.
I started “brownbagging” it. A cooler, several cans of caffeine free Coca-Cola, and two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. The first jelly was what I found in the fridge, Welch’s Grape Jelly. Then a few jars of Smuckers.
Over time, when Debby and I did any traveling, I started buying jars of jam at various gift shops, wineries and other retail stores that we stopped in. As the cans of Coca-Cola decreased with bottles of water replacing them, I also began to learn what I wanted in a jam.
I much prefer preserves to jelly; I like to have some pieces of fruit in the jam. I learned that if the sugars were over ten grams in a tablespoon, it would be too sweet (today there is only water in the cooler, no Coca-Cola.…not even in the house!). Also, I avoid any jam that lists corn syrup or any thing like it in the ingrediants. I also prefer that the ingrediant list begins with the appropriate fruit and the fewer ingrediants the better.
Two weekends ago, Debby had a weekend with her daughter in St. Louis. One of the places they went to was the Missouri Botanical Garden. While there, Debby, being the loving, thoughtful person she alway is, bought a jar of jam for me. She checked the label. No corn syrup and 2 grams of sugar per serving.
It did not take long for me to check the nutrition label when Debby gave me the preserves. “Two grams of sugar…gee, that might not be sweet enough,” I thought to myself. But I had just recently finished off a jar of jam that had only five grams of sugar and it was excellent. So I looked forward to trying my new preserves.
Just a couple of days later, I finished the jar I was using and opened my new preserves. I made the second sandwich with the new stuff, the first sandwich with the last of the previous jar. Then I licked the knife.
It tasted very sweet.
When I ate the sandwiches, I knew immediately when I bit into the one with the Missouri Botanical Garden Blackberry Preserves. It was sweet. Very sweet. Too sweet.
There is no way in heck that those preserves have only two grams of sugar per serving. That jar is so sweet, I can’t even believe that the two is a misprint for twelve. Twenty one maybe. It is not edible.
I will further comment that the preserves have a texture more akin to jelly than to preserves. There is little if any pieces of fruit. It is hard for me to judge due to the overwhelming sweetness, but the blackberry flavor that I think I maybe can detect is good.
I wonder if Debby can get her money back?
Are blackberries naturally sweet berries? The “no sugar added” thing on the front stands out too. Perhaps it and the “2 g” are misprinted or, perhaps, creative marketing.
I do not believe that blackberries are as sweet as some other berries (especially strawberries, blueberries and raspberries). In this case no sugar added simply means it is sweetened with something else, white grape juice concentrate. Grapes can be very sweet. I have to believe that the 2 grams of sugar is a misprint.
The 2 wasn’t a misprint.
The G stands for gallons.
That’s two gallons of sugar syrup, boiled down to make this jar of preserves.
;o)
I don’t know, I didn’t taste the jar.
:)