Palisade Peach and Hatch Green Chile Jam Recipe That’s Totally Colorado

This time of year we start to get into the height of the peach and chile season! Now, I'll admit, I am not a big fan of peaches... Or I should say I wasn't a big fan of peaches. I have been missing out on Palisade peaches for a very long time. I had no idea how awesome they were. There is no comparison when it comes to peaches that these are by far the best thing when it comes to fruit I have ever had. I was lucky enough to score a flat of them. I gave away most of it, but we kept a few for ourselves to enjoy.

My favorite time of year is when the chile stands open! The smell in the air lets me know that fall is right around the corner and I'll still get plenty of heat through the winter months with these chiles. My favorite chile stand opened up on August 9th and so far I have bought 4 bushels of green chiles so far and plan on doubling that amount before the roasting season is over.

We bag the chiles up by the dozen and hoard them away in our freezer to keep all year. So far, we have about 42 dozen bags of green chile.

In the past few weeks we have tried our hand at canning and pickling some jalapenos. They came out great, so I wanted to experiment with something else. Last night, we decided to make some jam with the Palisade peaches and thought it would be nice to add some heat to the sweet. Here is how we made our Palisade Peach and Hatch Green Chile jam.

Ingredients 

• 4 cups of pureed peaches
• 7 cups of sugar
• 1/4 cup of fresh lemon juice
• 7-8 Hatch green chiles
• 1 packet of liquid pectin

We started off with boiling a pot of water to blanch the peaches in and a bowl of ice water to cool them off immediately after. Cut a small X shape in the bottom of the peaches and put them in the boiling water for about 30 seconds and then move them to the ice water bath... Skin peels right off!

Now on to the chiles... Since we had a fresh bag from the Saturday bushel haul, they didn't need to be thawed. They were peeled, de-seeded, de-veined and then put into the food processor for a fine chop. Remember to wear gloves while doing this or you might be very sorry.

In a clean pot we combined the peaches, sugar, chiles, and lemon juice and brought the mixture to a rolling boil. We then added the liquid pectin and let boil for another minute. After that, we skimmed the foam off of the top and proceeded to can the newly made jam.

We ended up with 8 jars of spicy sweet goodness to use over the next 18 months! I have a feeling that I will be doing more canning and preserving in the future as I find it to be quite rewarding and fun!