Pim Techamuanvivit’s dalliance with a random strawberry farmer didn’t end well.

To make her strawberry compote, Techamuanvivit--blogger, author and garagiste jam maker--relies on small, perfectly ripe berries. After that one-time affair, she returned to her original fruit source: Santa Cruz’s Dirty Girl Produce.

Dirty Girl’s berries are the best options for her labor-intensive compote. She first sugars the whole berries and leaves them to macerate. The fruit is cooked in the accumulated liquid in stages--heated and then cooled multiple times--until the whole berries are soft but not mushy, and the liquid is a deep shade of ruby.

The compote ($12 per 6 ounce jar) is available in two variations: one enhanced with hibiscus and Madagascar vanilla, the other with rosewater from Hédiard in Paris and hibiscus. We can think of myriad uses for either: stirred into yogurt, drizzled over vanilla ice cream or spooned on buttered toast. Use the leftover syrup in place of the simple syrup in this Tom Collins recipe.

When it sells out (as it inevitably and quickly will), take heart: She’ll be making other jams all summer long, and if you sign up now for her weekend jam-making class, you could be, too.

Available at shop.chezpim.com and at Bi-Rite Market, 3639 18th St. (at Guerrero St.); 415- 241-9760 or biritemarket.com