Ok, so I gathered and pitted and quartered more of the sour cherries today, enough to get me to the 3 cup mark. But I happened also to read that you really want to use them ASAP, preferably the same day you pick them, so rather than waiting until I had the four cups the Ball recipe calls for, I'd just make 3/4 of a recipe.

Boiled up the 3 cups of cherries with the 3.6875 cups of sugar and a teaspoon of margarine (to keep foaming down) and a teaspoon of almond extract. Added my 1.5 pouches of pectin, boiled the minute more, and started ladling the mix into my sterilized jars and sealing with wax. Got everything sealed up, then used my finger to scoop some off the ladle to taste.

Magnificent. I got 6 jars (8 oz), and every one a treasure. I think I have GOT to plant more bush cherries. I had bought two originally, but the one under the cherry trees died off, I think they really need full sun.

Also just placed an order for some saffron crocus, which I'm hoping I can keep alive as container flowers, to make them easier to propagate as they divide.

Anyone got any 'omg, this is fantastic stuff' recipes that they've tried at home?

I've got two cherry trees and a bush cherry. The cherry trees are sweet, supposed to be 'black lapin', but to be honest, I've never seen the fruit get anywhere near black. But there's some bug that loves them, and basically any cherry I don't lose to brown rot, I lose to larvae eating them from inside and blue jays eating them from the outside.

The sour cherry bush, however, is producing fine, and has (knock on wood) no signs of brown rot, and apparently no bugs that like the fruit. Over the last couple of days, I pulled a salad bowl's worth of fruit off it, and now have 2 cups of pitted and halved sour cherries. I'll possibly get another 2 cups of fruit off it this year, but I want to make something now, before the fruit I've picked and cut goes off. It won't make a lot, but I bet I can get three or four 8 oz jars out of it.

So, any must try favorite recipes for sour cherries?