The strawberries themselves weren't anything special they were a bargin @ 89c a punnet and just right for making jam, and as some of you might know i can't resist a bargain so i dived in without planning ahead.
I bought them at Preston market on the Friday intending to make jam over the weekend but along with attending dance performances and musicals (of the Poppins variety) I managed to get side tracked along the way. Surprisingly after spending a few days in the fridge i was pleased to find that the punnets held up well, there were only a few casualties and after washing and picking over I had an easy kilo to work with. I prefer to use a smaller firm fruit rather than the big fleshy ones - save them for dipping in chocolate, a real crowd pleaser (mmmmmm thanks Caz!). When buying i check to see that the fruit has good colour, not too over ripe and that there isn't any condensation inside the containers (a sign they have been picked wet) and no mush or mold showing through on the underside.
I checked out a few recipes online but returned to an old faithful recipe which is a kilo of berries for a kilo of sugar with the juice of one lemon thrown in. I would love to find jam recipes that uses less sugar but i am not so keen on runny jams, especially strawberry (although i would love to hear from anyone who can recommend one. I think apricots can work quite well with less sugar if they are a firm fruit.)
Other recipes suggested soaking the berries in sugar for a couple of hours before cooking or only boiling the fruit and sugar for 12 minutes as the berries were said to spoil.
However i kept it simple - I mixed the fruit and sugar together in a big pot, with the lemon juice and gently warmed the mixture through stirring it till the sugar dissolved. Once the sugar had dissolved I turned up the gas and brought it to a quick boil and kept the mixture rolling along on a steady boil for about 25mins. I tested it by coating the back of a wooden spoon and dripping a small amount onto a saucer to check the viscosity. You can add butter just before bottling but i didn't bother. I think this helps with removing the bubbles from the top of the jam but as you can see i don't tend to bother.
check out the colour!! (OMG it looks a bit like I just killed someone!)
