Currants and Raspberries

After making one jar of currant jelly on Tuesday I decided I wanted to make more. So we returned to Cherry Hill Farm and picked seven and a half pounds of currants last Thursday. Currants are fairly easy to pick. You just lift up the branch, and strands of currants hand down. You lift the whole strand off the branch.
I used the recipe from Joy of Cooking's: All About Canning. Basically you wash the currants, but don't have to remove them from the stem. You put them in a pan stems and all, crush some of them to release the juice, and bring to them to a boil. Then simmer the currants for about 10 minutes until all the berries have burst. Strain the juice through a jelly bag. For every cup of juice, add 3/4 to 1 cup of sugar. Bring to a boil in a large pan and cook until the jelling point. Pack into jars that have been sterilized in boiling water for 10 minutes. Then process the jelly for 5 minutes. My yield was (7) 1/2 pint jars of jelly.
The owner also gave us some of these champagne currants. I cooked them separately and then mixed in some of the red currant juice so that I had enough to make one 1/4 pint jar of jelly. We'll have to wait and see if it tastes any different, but it is a lighter color.While we were at Cherry Hill Farm we couldn't resist picking some raspberries as well. We picked about two quarts.
Matt had made a great apple tart before from Joy of Baking.com. So I headed there and found a Raspberry Cream Cheese Tart Recipe. We added in a few currants too, and it looks like they burst in the cream cheese during the cooking. It's a very good tart and we're still enjoying it for breakfasts.