Sweet Achocha Jam - The Weirdest Jam I've ever made!

So I grow a lot of weird and wonderful fruit and veggies, trying out different ones each year. 

One that we keep growing is achocha. Now I'm not saying I plant it every year, it's just the plant that keeps coming back!

 They taste okay, fresh and something quite different but they grow so abundantly I decided I needed to find some more uses for them. 

Searching the internet I stumbled on a blog where they had made sweet achocha jam. Worth a shot I thought. 

So I picked a basket full in literal minutes, the plant drips with them this time of year! The aim was to pick enough to top and tail them and still end up with half a kilo. As they're hollow they don't really weigh much so I tried to pick enough to make it worth while making jam. 

Over on my YouTube I put together a video of the whole process - it makes quite a fun video, especially as the children get involved (and a bit lively). People talk about making "evergreen" content on YouTube - that's content that people will search for, and although this does fit that brief I think it might still be a little niche! 

One weird thing was as I was cutting them up, my fingers went tight, like they were covered in glue and what was worst was it wouldn't wash off! 

The recipe I used was just what I normally do for jam, just 50% fruit and 50% sugar with a splash of lemon juice. 

The fruit took a while to get to setting point, but then went really gelatinous all of a sudden! 

The texture was a little bit like snot, but somehow not in a bad way. The flavour was really hard to pinpoint, almost like quince, the children said there was a hint of blackberry but I didn't pick up on that. 

I'm not sure we'll be making this again, it makes an alright preserve, but then I think I could add this amount of sugar to my socks and it would taste okay.

It has made me think I want to try to find something that really works for this vegetable (well fruit really), so I might try some pickles next. Willing to take ideas though! We've got until the first frost...

What's the weirded preserve you've ever made?