Jams

[nephilim]

Anybody here make their own jams at all?? I've started making some this year, and considering the harvest of blackberries I get every year, it makes sense to have them preserved than to have them eaten on the day in a crumble, pie or cake.

Is it worth getting "Jam sugar" or should I just use pectin sachets? I'd prefer to keep the sugar content as low as possible, so curious about the best way forward.

 

[Coldfeet]

I've made jam this year from the excess strawberries and raspberries we had, and used jam sugar, but only because that was what we had. I've done plum jam before, and that didn't need added pectin.

If you want to keep the sugar content low, are you sure you want to make jam? It's the sugar that preserves the fruit, so go too low and it won't work.

 

[nephilim]

Yeah I know, I work on roughly 300g of sugar for every 500g of fruit for my marmelades (so 800g overall weight of the product). However I've been told with Jam sugar you should use a 1/1 ratio, and I want to know if that is really the case.

 

[Toddy]

Find British Red's tutorials on Canning.
That way you preserve the fruits and don't necessarily need to make jam.

I've made jam for over forty years; I just used granulated sugar....75p a kg bag just now It works very, very, well indeed.
Pectin is usually made from concentrated apple these days, and if you add apples to your jam, it pretty much helps things along nicely.
1:1 is only dependant on the fruit you're using. Brambles....jelly or jam ?

If you really want to add no extra sugar, then you make stuff like the Sunwheel spreads. I think the Americans call it Apple Butter ?
Basically you make fruit pulp and then simmer it down until it's thick and pour (scrape) that into jars. Pears and Apples are lovely done like this

cheers,
Toddy


P.S. This thread is going to be shifted into The Homestead....I think it's more suited there.

 

[nephilim]

No worries where it goes.

I don't want to do jelly but actual jam. If it is 1:1 then I suppose I'll live with that. Just didn't want too if I could get away with it.

 

[Toddy]

The spread's really thick, but it's not jam/jam, iimmc.
Fruit is mostly water, you need some way of preserving that juiciness if you're making jam without it fermenting or going mouldy. For strawberries it's usual to add lemon juice; Bramble jam I have never had a problem getting it to set without adding either pectin or lemon juice. I do use 2kg ripe brambles, 225ml water and 2kg of plain granulated sugar. It's very good jam
If you know you'll eat your jam in short order anyway, you could have a play around with the quantities ? see how you get on with less sugar, and let us know

cheers,
Toddy

 

[nephilim]

Well usually the jam is gone within a week or two (if that) as its my daughters favourite. Unfortunately I lack the space to freeze brambles/blackberries otherwise I'd pick much much more than I currently do.

The mrs went out and picked maybe 100g or so, I picked around that yesterday, but today I plan to go out with my daughter and pick loads as I have 2 large kilner jars and 3 small kilner jars to fill up for jam!

 

[British Red]

I would certainly not buy jam sugar. I like to add the right amount of pectin for a recipe and vary it as needed - for a hard or soft set, by the fruit involved and just by watching it, using a cold saucer etc. I don't go much on sachets either - I use liquid pectin. You can buy it

...but its dead easy to make as well - crab apples, apple cores and skin etc.

Hope that helps

 

[nephilim]

How do you make the pectin from apples? I have a few apple trees near so could easily go and pick some.

 

[oldtimer]

Get hold of a copy of "Jams, Preserves and Chutneys" by Marguerite Patten. She will answer all your questions plus quite a few you hadn't thought of asking!
We haven't eaten shop-bought jam for 40 years.

 

[British Red]

Do you know, I don't think I have ever done that tutorial! I'll try and make one next month

In the mean time, have a look and the lovely Wendy Mae's tutorial

http://www.buildanark.net/index.php?pages/Making%20Your%20Own%20Pectin!.html

It doesn't have to be crab apples - use apple cores and skins for slightly unripe apples you have used to make apple crumbles

 

[Harvestman]

I use jam sugar. It works. I have also used the liquid pectin as per british Red's picture. I have also simply boiled up lots of windfall apples, and the liquid that reulsts is rich in pectin once you strain off the pulp.

I'm still trying to get red of last year's jam. Made too much as usual.

 

[sandbender]

We make lots of jams throughout the year with whichever fruits are in season, we end up with a surplus so there are some fabulous cherry or rhubarb jams from two or three years back that have dried to half the original volume in the jar. Mrs sandbender has been experimenting with using less sugar over the last couple of years, I'll see if there is an easily translatable recipe.

"...In the mean time, have a look and the lovely Wendy Mae's tutorial

http://www.buildanark.net/index.php?pages/Making%20Your%20Own%20Pectin!.html ..."

Useful looking site that, thanks.

 

[Quixoticgeek]

Anybody here make their own jams at all?? I've started making some this year, and considering the harvest of blackberries I get every year, it makes sense to have them preserved than to have them eaten on the day in a crumble, pie or cake.

Is it worth getting "Jam sugar" or should I just use pectin sachets? I'd prefer to keep the sugar content as low as possible, so curious about the best way forward.

I have made jam using both jam sugar and separate pectin. For me, Jam sugar is the better option. It's just easier. I some times use a mix of jam sugar and ordinary sugar, for fruits with a reasonable amount of pectin, like blackcurrants.

If you have an excess of blackberries, I highly recommend trying blackberry leather.

Julia

 

[Toddy]

Sandbender, I'm really curious...how the hang does the jam reduce in volume if it's sealed in the jar ?

I always make too much (average is over 60 jars a year, seven or eight varieties; it's not unknown for me to make over 100 jars a year; not quite up to BR's numbers, but still a fair amount to share around ) and there's always some old jars stashed in the pantry. There's gooseberry there that's six years old; I opened a jar of it a fortnight ago and it was perfect but it hadn't shrunk any, iimmc. The wax seal, the cellophane outer seal and the lid on top were all as neat and tidy as the day I made the jam.

So far this year I've made lemon jelly, rhubarb and ginger jam, rhubarb and strawberry jam, raspberry jam and jelly, blackcurrant jam and jelly, and I'm eyeing up brambles and rowans and apples, and maybe another batch of something or other with the rhubarb which has put on another flush of stems in this beautiful weather. There'll be local plums and damsons later on next month too

I also make syrups from raspberries, wild strawberries, elderflowers, blackcurrants and brambles, and I boil down the fruit juices to make apple and pear spreads.

Occasionally, if the local supermarkets have a sell off of the little crates of apricots or peaches, I'll make apricot jam too; I'm fond of that but they don't grow here.

Cherries I love fresh, or glacé, but I'm not fond of them cooked except in a Madeira cake I'm playing around with the idea of making some in alcohol though to use in mignardises and chocolates.

Couple of oatcakes, a scrape of jam and a wee thin sliver of rich cheddar ....food of the Gods.

cheers,
Toddy

 

[British Red]

Its always worth making jams for main courses too. Caramelised onion chutney is a jam, as is cranberry sauce, redcurrant jelly, mint jelly etc. Some odder ones work really well. I think cranberry jelly and pork is great - and chilli jam works on every food except cornflakes.

I'm not that fond of sweet jam on toast - but it has many other possibilities

 

[Toddy]

I do make chutney, but I kind of think on it as reduction boiling, iimmc, rather than real jam. I admit I like the fruity ones and there's always mincemeat
I wish that some of the soft veg, like cucumbers, marrows, tomatoes and so on were easier to grow here. Soft fruit thrives, to the extent that it's often left to rot on the trees in the glut, but veg type fruits need a lot of work and sheltered space.

We use rowans for game, and spiced apple sauce for pork dishes usually.
Mint jelly I like, but no one else seems keen. "Wee bits of greenery stuck in your teeth!, and a taste like weird toothpaste" I like mint cordial too though

I have a cranberry bush...a tiny wee thing yet, that I bought last Autumn and have managed to over Winter and keep it alive through the heat too. I'd be really pleased to get a crop from it, but I suspect I'd need an awful lot of bushes to do much with.

cheers,
M

 

[cranmere]

Ref. the quantity of sugar, if you boil it to the temperature required to get it to set you will always end up with roughly the same % of sugar no matter where you started because temperature is dependent primarily on the concentration of sugar. The boiling evaporates water until you get to the right sugar concentration. If you don't have enough sugar it won't keep well and will go mouldy in a short time.

One thing I do is to cook the fruit and puree it, then freeze it in small blocks for use as sauces.

 

[sandbender]

"...Sandbender, I'm really curious...how the hang does the jam reduce in volume if it's sealed in the jar?.."

These are always jars that have been sealed with cellophane only, I presume the water content evaporates and we end up with something that closely resembles quince cheese in texture, the cellophane is sucked into the jar entrance forming a parabola.

"...I wish that some of the soft veg, like cucumbers, marrows, tomatoes and so on were easier to grow here..."

It is cucumber season here and we have several jars on all the windowsills.

 

[Toddy]

There we go; learned something new

I grow quince, but I rarely use them for much more than an occasional jelly; I think they make a beautiful pot pourri for the house in Autumn though One small bowlful will gently scent the entire house

If Mrs Sandbender would oblige with a recipe for the quince cheese, I'd be interested to try it out

cheers,
M