The winning jar

Source: an original fiction extract.

The red rosette stood beside a jar that was not Beth's best. She knew it as soon as she saw the colour: a little too dark, the fruit cooked longer than she had intended. The pale jar beside it had the clean taste she wanted, but the judge had passed it over. Around the table, people were congratulating her. Her father lifted the winning jar and turned it towards the window. 'Your grandmother would have liked this,' he said. Beth smiled before she could decide whether she agreed.

She had entered the village preserve competition because her grandmother's recipe book had been found in a kitchen drawer. It contained exact quantities beside instructions that made no sense without her: wait until it looks ready; don't let it get away from you. Beth had spent four evenings making small batches and writing temperatures in the margins on removable slips. She wanted to understand what those brief instructions meant. The competition had seemed a useful deadline. Now everyone appeared to think the rosette was the point of the experiment.

The judge came over while Beth was packing. He praised the deep flavour and said the darker jar reminded him of something his mother used to make. Beth almost explained that it had caught at the bottom of the pan. Instead, she asked whether he had tried the other one. He had, he said, and it was perfectly pleasant. The phrase landed more heavily than criticism. She wrapped the pale jar in a tea towel and put it beneath the table. Her father asked if she wanted a photograph with the prize.

At home, Beth set both jars on the kitchen counter. Her younger brother spread some from the winning jar on toast, frowned and asked for the other. Her father said that taste was a matter of opinion, but Beth could hear the effort he was making to be reassuring. She gave him a slice with each kind. They ate standing up. For a while nobody spoke about the competition. Her brother finished the pale jam and used a clean spoon to take another portion. Beth watched him do it, then opened the recipe book.

On a fresh slip she wrote the times for both batches and what had happened in each pan. Beside the darker one she added: won first prize. Beside the paler one: the one I prefer. She did not cross either out. Her father pinned the rosette to the kitchen board, where it covered half a shopping list. Beth asked him to move it a little so she could read what they needed. The next morning she packed a jar of the pale jam for her aunt and included a note asking how it compared with the version she remembered.

Consider the whole source. A reader said: “The prize disappoints Beth because it rewards the wrong thing, but the ending shows that she can value the recognition without letting it decide her own judgement.” Evaluate how far you agree. Support your judgement with detailed references to the text and the writer’s methods.