While we were at football practice last year, I found several muscadine vines that were easy to get to and looked promising. When harvest time came around, however, there was only enough to make a pint or two of jam so I kept looking. I didn’t find any more muscadines, but I did find a bunch of wild (fox, river, etc.) grapes. I remember eating those as a kid, and they were terrible. I found a recipie for grape jam, and saw that it called for wild grapes. Checked around the internet, and low and behold, people eat that stuff. I thought it may be worth a try, so I took #3 kid and we harvested a coule of pounds of fox grapes. Turns out the jam is (as they say) “the bomb.”
It is super good. Here is the recipie:
Fox Grape Jam
wash a mixture of ripe and unripe wild grapes (about four cups)
Put fruit in a saucepan with a small amount of water (1/2 cup)
Add 1 quartered apple
Boil grapes until they are soft an dbegin to lose their color. Strain them through a wire mesh collander. Mash the apple pulp through the mesh.
For each cup of juice, add 3/4 cups of sugar. Bring it to a boil and keep heating until it begins to jell (about 220 Degrees).
Can it with 1/4 inch headspace.