Remember those gorgeous strawberries I showed you last week? Well, I ate some, and then decided that I wanted the rest to be jam. I know the strawberry bounty is coming soon, and I wanted more small-batch jam-making practice.
At the recommendation of Kate from The Hip Girl’s Guide to Homemaking, I picked up Eugenia Bone‘s fantastic book, Well-Preserved, which contains “recipes and techniques for putting up small batches of seasonal foods.” I love the layout of the book: Bone provides you will a recipe to preserve a seasonal food, and then shows you two or three ways you can use your canned goods later. Plus, the photos are stunning. Yum!
I was flipping through all my canning books trying to decide which jam to make with the strawberries, and Bone’s strawberry balsamic jam looked stunning. Now, it did not look like jam – more fruit in syrup – but I decided to see what would happen.
I may have cooked it too long because I didn’t start my boiling-water bath early enough, or maybe my making a small batch even smaller meant that it cooked down more, leaving me without whole strawberries. Either way, it’s still delicious and I’ll be eating it very soon. Possibly between layers of cake, as Ian suggested.
Strawberry-Balsamic Jam (adapted from Eugenia Bones’ Well-Preserved)
2 c washed and hulled strawberries
1-1/4 c unrefined sugar
1/8 tsp unsalted butter
1-1/4 tbsp balsamic vinegar
Start your boiling-water bath! Sterilize your jars when your jam has been boiling for about 30 minutes.
Place the strawberries in a pot and bring to a boil over medium heat. Once the strawberries are boiling, add the sugar and stir until it is thoroughly dissolved.
Bring to a boil and then add the butter, which will help keep the foam volume down. Turn the heat down to medium-low and gently boil the jam for 40 minutes, until thickened to a loose, soft jam.
Stir in the balsamic vinegar.
Carefully ladle the jam into a sterilized jar. Process in a boiling-water bath for ten minutes, then remove the lid and leave the jars in the water for five more minutes.
This made 1/2 pint of jam.
6 Comments
Yaay! Looks great! Unless you don’t plan on eating it for a while, you don’t even have to waterbath process it, nor sterilize the jar. Just ladle your boiled down jam into a clean, hot jar (I just let mine sit with some really hot water from the tap for a few min) and then let it cool on the counter for a little while. After which point, throw a lid on it and pop it in the fridge.
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Kat Reply:
May 26th, 2010 at 6:22 pm
That’s a good point! I’m a fan of having some stuff stashed away – especially after my recent rhubarb jam extravaganza – and sometimes I forget that it can just go in the fridge for instant jam gratification.
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Whoa! Looks delish.
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Kat Reply:
May 27th, 2010 at 6:51 am
Thanks! It’s quite tasty. Jam is a fun new adventure!
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I am sending you my Jams and Jelly cookbook and Pickles cookbook. They have the recipe I used for strawberry jelly when you were little.
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Kat Reply:
May 28th, 2010 at 3:25 pm
Oh, thanks Mom!!! I’ve been trying to figure out what I wanted to do for a plain strawberry jam.
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