Allotments 4 All
Produce => Recipes => Topic started by: Jesse on June 14, 2004, 20:57:05
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I have promised my son (5) and daughter (3) that I will take them to the PYO farm to pick strawberries next week. Experience from last year tells me that we will come home with a truck load of strawberries (okay maybe that's a slight exaggeration)!
Does anyone have a really good recipe for strawberry jam?
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Anne's recipe is 1lb strawberries, 14 0z of sugar and juice of 1 lemon. Simmer fruit until soft, Add sugar and juice. Stir until sugar is dissolved. Boil rapidly until it sets. Bottle. Enjoy.
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Thanks for that Eric :). Can I use any kind of sugar?
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We use ordinary everyday castor sugar but you can use jam making sugar if you want.
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This is my recepie
3lb Strwberries
3Lb jam sugar
4 tablesppons lemon juice.
Put berries in a pan with lemon juice. gently cook over a low heat fo 10 mins until berries have softened. Add sugar and continue cooking over low heat until sugar dissolves. Increase heat and bring jam to a rolling boil for 4 minutes (or until setting point is reached. Remove pan from heat and skim off any surface scum with a slotted spoon. Pot and Seal
You can use ordinary sugar but jam sugar is much more failsafe especially regarding setting. I also find it much quicker
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Dont forget to warm your jars and put wax discs on top of your jam though.
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Thanks all, I will be making strawberry jam next week. I do have the wax discs for the jam lids but was wondering about one final question. Do I wait until the jam cools in the jars before sealing the lids or do I seal whilst still hot? Silly question I know!
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Seal whilst still hot ;D (wax side down!) Oh and try and get small strawbs for your jam if poss. I have a recipe that you pour the sugar over the strawbs, and let sit overnight. They say it pulls the juice from the berries, and helps to keep them whole whilst cooking. Oh and don't forget to make a loaf of home made bread at the same time ;D
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Thanks DP! I don't think I'll have much control over strawberry size though, have you ever tried to convince a 3 and 5 year old that the smaller ones are better!
When I bought my jam jars from Lakeland I also pathetically gave in to an impulse buy and bought an ice-cream maker so will have a bash at making some home-made ice cream as well, no prizes for guessing, the first batch will be strawberry ice-cream! ;D
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"Pathetically?" Naaaa - sounds like good planning to me! You can be SO much more adventurous with home-made ice-cream - good one!
All best - Gavin
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Mmmmmmmm home made ice cream! :)
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I have made jam in the Micro-wave.Think i posted a recipe on here for lemoncurd done in the micro wave as well which is a lot less messy.
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If using your own jam jars, which all good recycling people should ;D, remember to sterilise them after washing out thoroughly.
This can be done easily in a low oven for 10 mins or so.
Debs
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Thanks Debs, I was planning to pre-wash them in my dishwasher, would that not sterilise them enough?
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Jess best to put hot jam into warm jars, stops em cracking!
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i just made jam! can't believe it! but my strawberries are a wee bit floaty in the jars :D i think that'll enhance the experience, it'll be chunky at the start of the jar and smoother at the bottom!!
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Hey Legless, you may start a new trend and be bottling jam by the thousand supplying M&S or someone like that! ;)
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We went picking strawberries yesterday, dodjing the showers, and came home with almost a truck load of lovely yummy strawberries. :D
Today I have made some strawberry ice cream which looks lovely, it's chilling in the freezer as I type.
Also made some frozen yoghurt ice lollies, guess what flavour? Strawberry! Should be ready by the time schools out.
And made some yummy strawberry jam. Thanks Eric, I used your recipe and (although I got talking on the phone and left them to boil for a bit too long) the jam looks very yummy.
Now I have some cream left over, mmmmm maybe I should go and make some lovely scones to go with my left over cream and strawberry jam.
ps Legless, read that if you let the jam cool slightly before filling the jars then the strawberries won't float on top!
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Eton Mess (better then Eton Rifles -there's Jam link right there :) ) and you can work out any tensions bashing the meringues up.
Jeremy
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Sounds very yummy Jeremy and the best part is that it's quick and easy to make!
Has anyone had strawberries cooked on a BBQ? Friends made fruit kebabs (strawberries, pineapple, banana etc) with rum and icing sugar I think. I will have to get the details and post it on Recipes4All. I think it was one of Ainsley's recipes.
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We use redcurrant juice in strawberry jam instead of lemon juice. Plenty of pectin so it sets well, brightens the colour, and the extra acid helps boost the flavour.
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Sounds very yummy Jeremy and the best part is that it's quick and easy to make!
Has anyone had strawberries cooked on a BBQ? Friends made fruit kebabs (strawberries, pineapple, banana etc) with rum and icing sugar I think. I will have to get the details and post it on Recipes4All. I think it was one of Ainsley's recipes.
I normally place the fruit in a square of foil. Sprinkle over icing sugar and rum to taste. Fold foil over and seal the edges. Cook for 10-20 minutes on the babeque. Try serving with real vanilla icecream
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Not posting recipe here for strawberry jam, but on sunday I made some, first time ever and have got to say I will never ever buy another pot of supermarket jam again, its delicious, always make my own chuntneys etc..I suppose its because its the 1st year I've ever had so many strawbs and could'nt even give them away.So go on guys if you've never made jam before give it a go. :Debbiep :
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Legless,
If your strawbs were a bit 'floaty' in the jam, you may need to boil the jam for a little more time to achieve the correct setting consistency.
Its all very much trial and error - I've made sloppy jam and also chewy jam ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D
Its all a learning curve !!
Debs.
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Debs, I have made toffee flavoured strawberry jam (overboiling)!! And also sent daughter into school with a small jar of Elderberry jam, to make her jam puffs last week, she opened it and it was slightly mouldy on the top! :o The teacher insisted on throwing it away! :o :o :o (i would have just scraped it off the top and used it anyhow!!)
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Your right Sweetpea there is nothing like homemade jam. Been busy making strawberry this last few days. Today made just 3 jars of straw/raspberry mix due to small amount of fruit left today but usually make the raspberrie into jelly nowadays as don't like seeds! It's delicious.
Think I must be getting lazy as I find using the special jam sugar that only needs 4/5 mins hard boiling much less trouble to make.
DP youre right I think, if only people realised all the preservatives and (un)natural colourings in shop jam they wouldn't be frightened of a wee bit natural mould!
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Jeremy, tried your suggested recipe, had some left over egg white from making ice-cream so made my own meringues for the first time, kids love them. The pudding was delicious, thanks! :)
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Hi all. Just read here about sterilizing jam jars and using wax discs. I'd like to tell you how I have been doing it without the above and never had a problem.
I re-use normal jars (that jam, beans etc. are bought in) and have several people save only the lids of these type of jars for me (my regular suppliers are rewarded with a jar of jam every now and then). The lids can be re-used only a few times but need to be inspected carefully, they should have no blemishes or scratches on them and the rubber ring near the edge needs to be intact.
While the fruit is boiling I wash the jars and lids well, rinse and set them all in a dish pan with very hot water so they are covered. One by one I fish a jar and a lid out of the hot water with tongs and set it on a thick newpaper (not on the cold work surface), fill the jar all the way to the top (keep the rim clean) and quickly twist the lid on tightly. Set the jar opside down and after about 15 minutes turn it right side up, by this time the center part of the lid will usually have popped in or will do so soon, so you know it's air tight.
So, basically I just put the boiling jam in clean, hot jars and put clean, hot lids on. The jars get heated even more while filling and by turning them upside down directly after closing also makes the lids hot. I've never had a jar of jam go bad on me.
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My mum always re-used jars that other stuff came in. She even used to sterilize them in the microwave - 2/3 fill all jars with water, and heat for a minute or so per jar, enough to make the water boil. I think she just carefully poured the hot water out and left them to dry on their own.
We used to have a peach tree, a nectarine tree, 2 apricot trees (i miss those) a cherry plum tree, and a raspberry patch(I really miss that :P), so lots of jams and chutneys were made by my mum.