Reason No. 473 on why you should learn how to can

I've been spending the day happily browsing Andrea Weigl's new Pickles & Preserves, a volume in the Savor the South series from UNC Press. It is a pleasant reminder of the joys of canning, a welcome thought on this day when our windows are open to a sunny and mild March afternoon. 

I am reminded of the contentedness that comes from both making canned goods and sharing them with friends, as well as the simple pleasure of opening a jar of something that tastes as seasonal as the day it was sealed. With such good cheer, could one be faulted for using one's own canning pantry to create a cocktail at 4 in the afternoon?

Sad news on a day last summer halted my plan to make Bill Smith's famous honeysuckle sorbet. Rather than pitch the fragrant infusion, I turned it into a simple syrup and placed filled pint jars in a boiling water bath. I hoped for the best, assuming the delicate flavor would droop.

But, oh, it did not. Combine with muddled mint and lemon, a spoonful of jam, a shot of vodka and a splash of soda, and you've got a taste of summer on a not-quite spring day.

Honeysuckle Sipper

Makes one drink.

2-3 fresh mint leaves
1 slim wedge of lemon
1 generous teaspoon raspberry jam (or other flavor)
3 ounces honeysuckle syrup
2 ounces vodka
club soda

Muddle mint and lemon in a cocktail shaker. Add jam and ice, then honeysuckle syrup and vodka. Shake vigorously.

Strain and pour into tall ice-filled glass. Top with club soda and give it a quick stir. Garnish with a mint leaf. (If it's your first one. Otherwise, forget it.)

Rinse and repeat.

Town lore: Crook’s Corner’s honeysuckle sorbet

This blog was first published by Chapel Hill Magazine.

Most nights in May, right around 6 p.m., Bill Smith walks out the side door of Crook’s Corner with an iced pitcher concealing a can of Pabst Blue Ribbon. He heads directly across the street then down a path leading to a tangle of plants and weeds that sprout from the broken asphalt of an abandoned parking lot.

As he approaches a lush thicket one warm Friday night, the humid air hangs like a curtain. Step through it and you’ll be enveloped in the rich perfume of honeysuckles – an aroma so transporting that it instantly beckons forth childhood memories of pulling out the delicate stamens to reveal tiny beads of nectar.

“Sometimes, when the pitcher gets full of blooms, I just like to close my eyes and breathe in the aroma,” Smith says, leaning in as if nosing a snifter of fine cognac. “I’m amazed every time how intense it is.”

It’s not usual for this ritual to attract a crowd. This sultry night draws a young man on a bicycle who rolls in to inspect the harvest. He pauses to pull back his dreadlocks to cool his neck and ask what happening. “We pick these to make sorbet,” Smith says, launching in a polite speech delivered a hundred times each spring.

“That’s really cool that you make something with these,” the fellow says, inhaling deeply as he surveys the seemingly endless supply of weedy blooms. “They smell so good. It must be wonderful.”

It is. Smith’s honeysuckle sorbet is a true rite of spring at Crook’s Corner, the Chapel Hill landmark where whispers and hopeful online postings routinely draw room-filling crowds. Even though the recipe is posted in Smith’s celebrated 2005 book, Seasoned in the South (Algonquin Books), and available from several online links, fans prefer to enjoy it made by the hand of the master.

“It’s part of town lore,” Smith says with an amused shrug and a swig of PBR. “Sometimes, when people hear it’s available, it’s like a riot in here. It’s the same with soft shell crabs. I’ve trained my staff to be clear: We will have it when we open at 5:30. No, we cannot save it for you.”

Despite this, some diners can’t help but make a fuss when the legendary stuff runs out. “I tell them, ‘It’s time to be an adult,’” Smith says, peering over his glasses in a humorous visage of mock scolding. “People do sometimes lose it, but seriously. I mean, we’ll have more.”

Until they don’t. Honeysuckle sorbet is available most nights in May, and sometimes well into June, so long as the bushes are productive. After that, fans must be patient until the following spring.

“We tried to save a batch once as a special treat for New Year’s, but it tasted like sugar and ice,” he recalls. “The flavor just disappeared.”

It took three years for Smith to perfect the recipe, which yields a snowy, fragrant sorbet that he swears is different with every batch. A sampling from different pickings both were exceptionally delicious and refreshing, but in fact, one was decidedly more floral and satisfyingly slushy.

Elizabeth Du Bosc of Chapel Hill has been addicted for years. She stops at Crook’s Corner at least two or three times a week when it’s available, including her May birthday, and gleefully brings friends and family to get them hooked as well.

“You are God’s gift to TASTEBUDS,” she declared recently on her Facebook page, where she also confessed to dabbing a bit behind her ears like perfume. She’s also slurped this season’s treasure wearing a tiara of woven honeysuckle blossoms.

Not everyone is so convinced. At least once a year, Smith says, “I get yelled at by angry botanists. They say things like, ‘Don’t you know that’s an invasive species?’ Good lord. I didn’t plant it, and at least I’m making use of it. It’s silly to castigate me.”

While angry botanists may disapprove, wild honeysuckle can be found on roadsides and along greenways throughout the Piedmont. A forager’s delight, it takes hardly any time to collect enough for a batch of sorbet, which requires little more effort than using an ice cream machine to turn into the stuff of mid-spring’s night’s dream. Smith favors an old-fashioned crank with rock salt, but whatever you’ve got should work.

Honeysuckle Sorbet
@2005 Bill Smith with permission of Algonquin Press.

4 cups (tightly packed buy not smashed) honeysuckle flowers, leaves and stems discarded
5 ½ cups cool water
1 1/3 cups water
2 cups sugar
Few drops of freshly squeezed lemon juice
Speck of cinnamon

Place the flowers in a nonreactive container (glass or stainless steel) and cover with cool water. Weight down with a plate. Let them stand on the counter overnight.

In a small sauce pan make a syrup out of the sugar and water by boiling it until all sugar is dissolved and it begins to look lustrous and slightly thick, 3-5 minutes. Add a few drops of lemon juice to prevent the sugar from recrystalizing. Cool the syrup completely.  Strain the honeysuckle infusion, gently pressing the blossoms so as to not waste any of your previous efforts.  Combine the two liquids and add the merest dusting of cinnamon. You don’t want to taste it but you can tell if it’s not there. Churn in an ice-cream maker. This does not keep more than a week or two.

Crook’s-inspired Honeysuckle Jelly – two ways

This blog was first published by Chapel Hill Magazine.

Honeysuckle sorbet is one of the many signature dishes that makes Crook’s Corner a Chapel Hill landmark. Developed by Chef Bill Smith from a Renaissance-era recipe for jasmine ice, the delicate flavor of this decadent slush inspires near riots in the West Franklin Street eatery every spring.

Smith’s fuss-free recipe is easy to recreate at home, and it converts nicely into a simple but intoxicatingly fragrant jelly. Indeed, the ingredients are nearly identical, with the exception of added low-sugar pectin and canning jars instead of an ice-cream machine.

The Crook’s-inspired Honeysuckle Jelly below is easily tweaked to create a jewel-toned strawberry variation – which no doubt would be insanely good made instead with sun-warmed wild blackberries, which just happen to grow amid Smith’s preferred honeysuckle patch. Either way, the recipes are so simple and reliable that they were used to teach a first-time canner how to make jelly.  

Smith prefers to pick honeysuckles in the evening, when their perfume is heavy, but concedes he’s had delicious results with flowers plucked dewy-fresh is the morning, too. An ideal time is after a rain, when older blooms have shaken loose, leaving the best pickings behind.

The honeysuckles used to make these jellies were gathered along the greenway of our North Raleigh neighborhood, but they can be found in plentiful supply along roadsides and other places where weeds thrive. Be careful to choose bushes that have not been chemically treated, and ask permission as appropriate.

You’ll likely observe a lot of variation – some flowers are pure white to the stem while others reveal a tender blush of pink, and the petals will range from white to buttery yellow. Avoid ones that are dark yellow or shriveled as they may be bitter, and for goodness sake, don’t bother pinching off the tiny green bases.

“Some people think I actually do that at the restaurant, or use just the stamens because that’s their childhood experience with honeysuckles,” Smith says with a chuckle. “If I did that, I’d never get around to making anything.”

Honeysuckle Jelly

4 cups (tightly packed buy not smashed) honeysuckle flowers, leaves and stems discarded
5 cups cool water
1 package low-sugar pectin (such as Sure-Jell in the pink box)
3 cups sugar
½ tsp. unsalted butter
1 tsp. freshly squeezed lemon juice
Speck of cinnamon

Prepare a dozen 4-ounce jelly jars (or comparable assortment) according to USDA guidelines.

Place the flowers in a nonreactive container (glass or stainless steel) and cover with cool water. Weight down with a plate. Sit on counter overnight or at least 8 hours. Drain mixture through a jelly bag or cheesecloth-lined colander. Measure 4½ cups honeysuckle stock; discard blooms.

In a deep, heavy-bottom pot – I use a pasta pot – pour in stock and add package of pectin and ¼ cup sugar. Over medium-high heat, stir until sugar and pectin are fully incorporated. Stirring often, add butter and bring mixture to a rolling boil that cannot be stirred down.

When at a full bubble, add the rest of the sugar all at once, plus the lemon juice and cinnamon. Stir frequently until mix returns to a rolling boil that cannot be stirred down. Use a timer or count off 60 seconds. Transfer pot to heatproof surface.

If necessary, skim any foam with a tight mesh strainer. Carefully pour hot jelly into prepared jars, top with warmed lids and finger-tighten screw-on bands. Place jars in water bath and boil for about 10 minutes. Turn off heat and let the jars settle for about 5 minutes, then carefully remove and set on a heatproof surface where they can remain undisturbed until cooled and set.

Don’t worry if the jelly does not set quickly. It should firm up nicely by the next day, but if it doesn’t, fear not. You can now boast of having made amazing honeysuckle syrup, great in cocktails or drizzled on desserts. If you’re daring, you can even dab a drop behind your ears.

Strawberry-Honeysuckle Jelly

2 cups fresh strawberries, coarsely chopped

5 cups water

Add strawberries to water in a medium sauce pan and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes. Remove from heat and cool to room temperature. Drain through jelly bag or cheesecloth-lined colander and discard remaining strawberry mush.

From this point on, continue as described in the original Honeysuckle Jelly Recipe, substituting 5 cups of strawberry water for plain water.