Topic: Very low sugar jam: Plaumenmus

[pg]

Hi all,

I haven't posted regularly for a while but I never went far!

It's the jam making season and I wonder how low will you go with your sugar? The usual jam advice is to use the same weight of sugar to fruit to aid keeping and taste, but I'm still eating well-kept 4 year-old blackcurrant jam using 66% sugar weight to fruit.

I'm interested in experimenting with lower sugar jams to see how fresh they will taste (I dislike very sweet jams) and how long they will keep.

I've come across Czech jam recipe called Pflaumenmus using 20% sugar:

http://cook.dannemann.org.uk/sweets/plumjam/

and I wondered if anyone had tried such a low level sugar recipe and how well it keeps.

I've seen jam recipes around the web for 50% jams too.

[PurpleHeather]

I do not think you need to make huge quantities of jam any way, if keeping is a problem, just freeze the fruit and make a low sugar jam as and when it is needed. The microwave method works well for small quantities.

I have found with older jams, the taste fades. So I prefer it very freshly made.

[pigeonseed]

Pflaumenmus is actually German originally - and yes I like it a lot, but have never made it, just bought it in jars when in Germany. They have similar sorts of syrups in Belgium as well, made of apple and so on. They're runny, and still pretty sweet, but not as sweet as jam. Nice, but different. Almost slightly savoury sometimes.

I've just contradicted myself... Well it's been a while since I've eaten it!  ;D

Well if you try it, then I'd be interested to see how well you find it keeps and if you like it.

[pigeonseed]

well in case it helps, I got vey curious, and I've googled 'Pflaumenmus' and 'haltbar' = keepable, and it seems to be generally felt that Pflaumenmus/plum puree lasts as long as jam, due to the sugar content (natural sugar?) and temp reached.

However I didn't come across any sites which I would say were official or specially qualified.

But I suppose it is meant to be a conserve, and they wouldn't have developed it if it didn't keep...  :-\

[kypfer]

I don't have a particularly "sweet tooth", so appreciate a bit of a "bite" in my jam. The jams and jellies I made up last year were mixed at 12oz sugar to a pound of liquid or cooked fruit, they were fine, but I did wonder if I didn't have to boil them down further for a set (ie effectively increase the sugar to fruit ratio) than I would have done had I started with more sugar in the first place. Probably depends to a great degree on the amount of pectin in the fruit. I simply didn't have sufficient fruit to do experiments, but the nett result is almost all gone and still looks fine (and tastes good as well).