Jammin' Jam

Ok, so the title is a little corny...it was Vera's idea. I'll give her all the credit this time! Since my post in April, I've enjoyed two more jam-making experiences. A few weeks ago, Vera and her boyfriend, Sean, spent the day with me making strawberry jam. We used the same recipe as I'd used in April when I made it for the first time, preparing the berries and then using the reduction method, cooking the fruit and sugar at a strong simmer for about 40 minutes. The resulting jam is thicker than a syrup, but not nearly as solid as a commercial jam. The flavor is fruity and intense and the color is a very deep red. We loved it! If there is any downside to making jam using the reduction method, it is the fact that you lose about half of the volume you begin with. For example, we started with 8 cups of berries and ended with about 4-5 cups of jam.

On the way home from our So Cal trip this past weekend, Verne and I stopped at a stand on Highway 88 in the heart of the cherry/peach/nut orchards between Clements and Stockton and I bought a lug of cherries (about 20 pounds). This past weekend, Vera and I spent a full day making cherry jam. As beginners to jam making, we decided to try several recipes and either settle on one or develop our own. All cherry jam recipes begin with the same step...pit the cherries. Until you've pitted a lug of cherries, you have no idea the work, amount of time, and the stained hands resulting from this step. It's been two days and my hands and fingernails are still stained! Lucky for us, I have a tool that is essential to making cherry jam...a cherry pitter. I can't say it makes quick business of cherry pitting, but I can't imagine removing the pit any other way. So, if you intend to make cherry jam, go to a well-stocked kitchen store and buy a pitter. Here's a pic of Vera pitting cherries...

and all of the pitted cherries ready to be preserved...

Since we both loved the strawberry reduction jam, our first recipe to test was a cherry reduction. Cooked for 40 minutes, it had reduced by half and was still a bit thinner than we'd like; but, we stopped at that so we'd be left with some jam for our efforts! Our second recipe called for pectin. Before my recent jam-making experience, I'd always assumed pectin was some kind of chemical additive. Actually, pectin is a natural product found in many fruits. The commercial pectin, either liquid or powder, is derived from apples. It's a thickening agent that's added along with the sugar to the fruit prior to bringing it to a boil. Rather than cooking the jam for 40+ minutes, it's a quick process that all up is no more than 10 minutes. Once the fruit, lemon juice, sugar, and pectin comes to an angry boil (that's a term I've picked up while reading jam recipes...and I love it!), it is only cooked for one minute and then removed from the heat and processed (that means canned). Our first pectin recipe was a failure. We started with 4 cups of fruit and 2 cups of sugar, lemon juice, and an entire box of pectin (the recipe actually called for 1 1/4 boxes of pectin, but I didn't want to break into a second box and it just seemed like a bit much). The resulting jam was solid...no movement at all! And, the overuse of pectin dulled the color and flavor dramatically! We decided to use the balance of the cherries (after Verne set aside enough for a cherry pie) to make one final batch, reducing the pectin by half. The results were close to perfect, that is, the consistency was near perfect. After a taste test of all four jams, we decided that it's sweeter than we'd like and our next test will be to cut the sugar in half.

Our plan is to buy more cherries and strawberries later this week and make a final batch of each using a reduced amount of sugar and 2 tablespoons of pectin to 4 cups of fruit. I believe we're very close to a final recipe! We still have a few months of strawberries, only a few weeks left for cherries, and it will soon to be peach/plum season and on to more testing. Nummy!