Unripe Figs, unexpected joy!

FIGGY JOY

My back garden faces north and is not the obvious place for a fig tree, with their love of sunshine and all that. For the last couple of years, the harvest has been frankly pitiful, a dozen, delicious ripe figs in total. 

This year, despite lots of sun and huge amounts of growth by said tree, the numerous figs failed to ripen. For weeks, we have willed them to turn from green to purple, but to no avail. So faced with a treeful of inedible green bullets, I determined to find a use for them.

I asked Greek and Bulgarian friends if they knew of any recipes for unripe figs - which of course they did. This gave me the confidence to give it a go. I found a number of other recipes on line and the one I have come up with is inspired by them. During my research, I found that unripe fig jam is given as a gift to newborn babies in Turkey. I'm going to keep a couple of jars back to celebrate new arrivals.

Now I can't pretend that this is a quick or easy recipe. The preparation is long, the latex that comes out of unripe figs can be an irritant to sensitive skin and it sticks like a b******* to everything you put the things in - but trust me, it is worth it! Since I made it today, I haven't been able to stop eating it - a nibble of fig, a nibble of a thin slice of griddled halloumi.... trust me, it is heavenly.

Jam - actually, it is nothing like a traditional jam, it is almost like a dessert. Try it with Greek yogurt, nuts and seeds for breakfast, in pancakes, with cheese - fantastic with grilled halloumi or feta, with ice cream.... on ultra thin pizza with feta and rocket... or... 

HARVEST ELF AND SAFETY TIPS

The sap that oozes out of Fig trees is a natural latex and some people - including me, can find the sap irritating to the skin, it gave me a bit of a rash. Plus the latex - as latex tends to be - it is very, very sticky and a bit tricky to get off. I would recommend wearing your marigolds at every stage of the process up until the point when you have boiled them the second time.... see recipe.

Pans, sieves, bowls, they will all get sticky. After a bit of trial and error, I found that a scouring pad with about a teaspoon of baking soda/powder, got it off pretty well. The granules seem to gather up the latex, so all good! 

ADAPTING RECIPIES

I've come up with my own recipe and method. I read through quite a few and followed them but decided that I liked my own tweaked version better. Please experiment with it - I've put in warming spices but more citrus would also be lovely.


Ingredients

• 1 kilo (2,20 pounds) unripe fig
• 1 kilo sugar
• 2 pints water (add more water if thin syrup preferred)
• Juice of 1 lemon
• 4 cloves
• 2 cinnamon sticks
• 1 vanilla pod
• Heaped dessertspoon each of cinnamon, turmeric, allspice,
• 2 squashed cardamons worth of seeds
• 2 dessertspoons honey

Instructions

1. Wash the figs and trim off the stems
2. Fill a large pot with water and boil the figs for about 10 minutes.
3. Let it cool.
4. When they are cool enough to touch, squeeze the figs gently to remove some liquid. I drain them and put them between two clean tea towels and gently squeeze.
5. Repeat steps 2 to 4.
6. Boil water and sugar together in another pan, add all spices.
7. Add the squeezed figs to it.
8. Boil them for about 25 minutes.
9. Finally, add lemon juice and boil it 5 minutes more.
10. Carefully fill jam jars will still warm, I put in a layer of figs then syrup, then figs and repeat until full.
11. Leave for 3 weeks then eat. Well that is what the other recipes said but I just ate them as soon as they were cool.

bargain bin halloumi, unripe fig jam, garnish of coriander and garlic chive flowers all from garden