Jam
If jam appeared at the sumptuous Athenian banquets and if it was the refined ornament of the feasts of Ancient Rome, European gourmets were longer to recognize it. Indeed, sugar was introduced in France only after the Crusades. At the beginning of the fourteenth century confectioners, attached to the very important corporation of «grocers», have only the privilege of making jams. Grocers were then, merchants of these remedies and coated with sugar, are the ancestors of sweets. They first adapted oriental recipes, brought back, like sugar, by the Crusaders, then pasta among which the «gingembrat» - candied ginger – and the «pignolat», based on pine nuts, are the most appreciated.
No doubt it was with one of these pastas that the present was presented to Charlotte of Savoy in 1467, for her entry into Paris: a stag made of jam, who had the arms of this noble queen hung at the collar, and several beautiful drageoirs full of sweets and beautiful jams. It was in 1555 that the first treatise on the art of jams appeared, whose author, Michel de Nostre-Dame, is better known as Nostradamus. His astrological predictions have done more for his glory than his confectionery recipes. Yet he is a goldsmith of matter. He knows how to adapt to the taste and fruits of the recipes born in the East and transmitted by Italy and Spain: one learns to make «the jelly of the guignesqui is as clear and vermeille as a ruby» or «the green ginger jam». Sugar being then an object of great luxury.
A few years later, Olivier de Serres, a lord of Vivarais, author of practical books on agriculture, advises, in turn, the manufacture of jams: peach or apricot pasta, whose recipe comes from Genoa, raspberry paste «sought after for its pleasant smell», lemon or orange zests that «dry in an oven», «muscadilles», pears so small that joined and candied in bonquets «we can put them all seven at the same time in the mouth», hence the name, pitoresque for the least, this “seven-in-the-mouth” treat Fashion takes hold of jams and the one who serves them to his guests ensures the reputation of his table. François first, it is said, had a real predilection for the cotignac, preparation at the bottom of coincas. One day he was enjoying it at Madame d'Estampes, his favourite of the moment, when he noticed that another gallant had hidden himself under the bed, he slipped him the box saying, "Here, Brissac, everyone must live !".
But such delights were reserved for the greats of this world for centuries, for sugar in France bought in Venice was an expensive product. It was not until the eighteenth century when sugar cane cultivation flourished wonderfully in the colonies of the West Indies to see the price drop slightly. But despite the abundance of production, sugar remained expensive because of the long sea transport. Its use was really democratized only under Napoleon, on the occasion of the discovery of beet sugar. Then began to spread at prices accessible to all consumers various confectionery products at the forefront of which included jams.
Under the name of jams there were then eight kinds of preparations:
Liquid jams, whole or in pieces, jams in a liquid syrup, transparent, which takes the color of the fruit that boiled there. The most prized of liquid jams are plums, Madeira limes, barberry and Levant green breakage.
Marmalades, a kind of semi-liquid pasta, are made of the pulp of fruits or flowers that have some consistency, such as apricots, apples, pears, plums, oranges or ginger, the use of which is recommended to people of age to whom they give “natural heat”.
Jellies are prepared with fruit juice or sugar is dissolved and then boiled to a slightly thick consistency, so that by cooling it looks like a kind of thin, transparent «glu». Jellies are made of a large number of fruits, but also meat, fish or deer horn. This kind of jam, which is usually the color of the most beautiful rubies, is sent in small round and flat fir boxes of various sizes, the smallest of which are called «friponnes».
Pasta is a kind of marmalade thickened by boiling until it can be molded and then dried in the oven. The most commonly used are currant, apple, orange blossom, pistachio pasta.
Dry jams require careful preparation or the fruits, cooked first in syrup, are then drained and dried in the oven. We make so many fruit jams that it would be quite difficult to explain them all. The most popular, however, are lemon and orange peel, plums, pears, cherries, apricots, almonds and green walnuts.
Candied fruits, jewels of the confectionery of the time, are whole fruits that, after boiling in syrup, remain covered with sugar, which makes them look like crystals of different colors according to the fruits they contain.
The dragees, finally, are other than a kind of dry jam made of seeds or aromatic roots coated in a very hard white sugar.
Sugar
A jam must contain 65% sugar, taking into account the part already contained in the fruit (10 to 15%) and the concentration produced by cooking. Count 50% sugar for 50% fruit, equal weight sugar-fruit in most jam recipes. For sweet fruits such as pears or grapes, 35-40% will suffice.
The dietary action of jams
Although it is of course entirely out of the question to consider jams as having medicinal properties, it has been found that their dietetic qualities make it possible to identify certain characteristics which are as follows:
- Apricot: Excellent for the intestine, irritating
- Cassis: Astringent, good for arthritics, diuretics
- Cherry: Reconstituting, remineralizing, diuretic, excellent for the liver and kidneys
- Lemon: Blood Purifier
- Strawberry: Anti-rheumatic, fortifying
- Pear: eliminates uric acid, remineralizing, detoxifying, regenerating
- Apple: Rich in mineral salts, cleanses the intestine
- Plum: Energetics, diuretics
- Rhubarbe: Laxative, remineralizing
