Strawberry Preserve

You know those people who like to reveal the entire plot of the recently released movie and say that the movie sucks big time? I keep wondering why they do it. Is it because they think they are being generous to save us some money by spoiling our only major outing plan?  Well they could not stop me! On Friday, the day slated for Raavanan's  release, the only updates I could see on facebook were either the plot and opinions about the movie. Not to say none of the opinions were on the positive and it was continuing to be the same all through the weekend. But did it stop me from seeing the movie? No! :-)

I ended up going for the night show or should I call it the evening show. Not that it mattered. We were sitting in the theatre along with 10 other people with a secret joy of having the entire theatre to us.  All of us became silent when the titles started. Then came couple of Hindi actors. We were all watching couple of dialogues, parts of a song and were eagerly waiting to find out how exactly all this fit into the Tamil movie.

And then it came, long sighs...when we realized, we were watching a trailer for an upcoming movie. The actual movie "Raavanan" then started. (Missed the whistles which is an integral part of watching a movie in India) Loved the movie. Found it visually stunning. I could see the movie again for all the visuals. Loved the climax location. "Beautiful" is how I can describe it. The underlying factor for the movie is "Love". Of course it is an integral part of Indian cinema. I would care less about the story (if any) and the acting. Finally there it was on Facebook. A positive review about the movie.

Coming back to my post, N had gone strawberry picking. He knew that I loved strawberries and my art of finishing a box of strawberries in one day. But what I did not expect was that, he would get 7 pounds of strawberries and expect me to finish it in a day since they were overly ripe. It was a day of strawberries for us. Strawberry dessert, strawberry milk shake and still there were 6 pounds of strawberries. Finally ended up making strawberry preserves taking the idea from Ina Garten, Barefoot Contessa. Here is the recipe:

Ingredients

Strawberries (cut into halves with the top portion removed) - 6 cups

Sugar - 1 cup (Change according to your taste)

Lemon Juice - 2 tbsp

Water - 1/4 cup

Salt - a pinch

Preparation

In a big pot, add sugar, water and lemon juice. Once the sugar has melted add the strawberries. Add salt. Lower the heat to low setting. Allow the entire mixture to simmer and thicken. Cook until the mixture gels on a cold plate (I kept the plate in the freezer) Once the mixture has reduced remove from heat. Allow it to cool and transfer to jars to use later.

I use these preserves for waffle topping, making milk shake, ice cream topping or just have a spoon of it whenever I feel like having something sweet :-)

Strawberry Preserves are ready and yummy!!!

~ Ramya