I was nervous about jam and jelly until a friend said these immortal words ‘if it doesn’t set, pour it back in the pot and boil it some more’. That and a new sugar thermometer and I was off. We’ve had a great strawberry season in the UK – at one point strawberries were £2 per kilo ($1.15 per pound weight for los Americanos). I found sugar at a good price and I have made a lot of jam.
Don’t worry the Davinator will not be at risk from strawberry jam poisoning. The same friend doesn’t make strawberry jam or jelly so we have an exchange programme – I’ll trade strawberry jam and crab apple jelly for whisky marmalade and damson jam. Plus I take away her crab apples and make jelly with those. Crab apple jelly (recipe here) is the best combo with peanut butter.
Strawberry jam is traditionally ‘macerated’ overnight. Maceration means you cut up the strawberries, combine them with sugar and pectin and leave them to do their thing. Next morning they are floating in strawberry juice and ready to cook and jar up.
If you’re new to preserving, do your homework first. Youtube is full of ‘jam for beginners’ videos and there is a legion of blogs. My recommendation is to identify your ‘method’ and stick to it. I was making jam, jelly and preserves from a young age – my sisters and I were mom’s kitchen slaves. So I come to this with a fair amount of experience. Your first jam experience may well leave your kitchen looking like a bomb went off but every time after that it improves.
Gadgets do help with jam. Below left is my 2 bowl scale for weighing sugar and pectin separately and below right is a gadget that takes the stem and slightly fibrous centre out of the strawberries in one smooth movement. See the short video I made here.
The other gadget I highly recommend is a proper sugar thermometer – old school analogue that clips to the side of the pan. This is my new KitchenCraft. (other brands are available). It’s predecessor was so old that the numbers were unreadable. Why analogue? You will stand there waiting for your jam to hit 105C and you don’t want to be dipping your high tech digital gadget every 10 seconds. And there’s no annoying tiny battery that is always dead just because it is and it’s not a size you have. Trust me on this one.
Let’s get on to the recipe. My instructions assume some experience but not a jam maestro level.
Recipe
Ingredients
1 kilo of strawberries
750 grams sugar
Pectin
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Jars and lids for approximately 1,000 mls of jam.
Instructions
- 12 hours before (at least – I leave mine for 36 hours) hull your strawberries and cut large ones in half. If you’ve got giant ones, maybe 4 pieces. But the lovely thing about this jam is the chunks of strawberries so don’t go too small.
- Get your sugar and pectin ready. I use plain sugar and add powdered pectin. Pectin is necessary for this jam. You can also use liquid pectin or jam sugar which has pectin included. My preferred pectin has me adding 8 grams per kilo combined fruit and sugar so 12 -15 grams for this recipe.
- Stir the sugar and pectin into the fruit to coat well – avoid the temptation to eat the sugared strawberries. I use a ceramic bowl, I’m always nervous about letting fruit juice sit in a metal bowl. Cover loosely with a shower cap or plastic wrap.
************************** Next Day ******************************* - Find your jars, lids, jam funnel, tongs, ladle, wax circles, gloves for handling hot jars.
- Sterilise your jars – I run mine through the dishwasher and then put them in the oven at about 130C in a baking pan. I take the pan out and leave the jars in it as I fill them – it contains any mess. I put the lids in boiling water with the jam funnel then lift them out with tongs as I go.
- Tip the strawberry sugar mixture into a heavy pan – I use one of my le Creuset pots. Add the lemon juice and set over a low heat. Dissolve all of the sugar before you turn the heat up or you may have sugar lumps in your jam.
- Sugar all dissolved, it’s time for the scary part – boiling the jam mixture until it reaches 105C (220F) on your thermometer. There are other methods for checking the set – here’s one from BBC Goodfood. Personally I prefer the thermometer. n
- As the jam is boiling you can skim any scum that has risen to the top. Use a metal spoon, only do this once near the end – it reduces wastage.
- Your jam is ready to put in the jars – I have a pair of oven mittens that I use for this step (see photo below – gift from one of my sisters in Michigan) because they are flexible enough to allow me to use the ladle and tongs and insulated enough to protect my hands and wrists. Fill your jars, top with wax circles or liquid paraffin. Put the lids on and tighten as soon as you can handle the jars.
- Label your jars and remember to put the date on them. Your jam should last a year stored in a cool dark place. Refrigerate after opening is recommended. Jam doesn’t last long enough in this house to need that, though.
Don’t be tempted to double batch the recipe. It will be difficult to reach the correct temperature without scorching the jam. I tend to have two batches ‘working’ at the same time. One coming up to the boil and the other on a gentle simmer to dissolve the sugar.
Thank you for reading the blog – sorry its been so intermittent, it’s been a busy social and sporting summer here in England. Let me know if you try the recipes and have any feedback – I did leave out a crucial step in herby courgette bread until someone pointed out that at no point did it tell you to add the grated courgettes 😳.