Made my first Blueberry jam last night.

[Stubbornhillfarm]

Jarred77, peach butter sounds awesome! I personally can't wait for apple picking time, because I love apple butter. I will give the peach butter a try for sure. I hope to get some more peaches tonight.

Carol, violet and blackberry sounds very interesting. We have access to some wild blackberry bushes, but don't have any violets. Do you suppose if they have some at the florist they would be the same? Sounds like a silly question...

vfem, YUM!!! We were having a tough time getting the jam to thicken up last night. I told my husband, if it doesn't thicken up correctly, we will just use it over vanilla ice cream. It finally did thicken and hopefully it is not like a big solid brick of jell. If it is, I'll slice it like canned brown bread and put in on an english muffin!

trunkman, we planted some too. They took a little beating as apparently I didn't water them enough. I am sure they will be fine. But I too await the day that I can pick blueberries in my own yard!

 

[vfem]

vfem, YUM!!! We were having a tough time getting the jam to thicken up last night. I told my husband, if it doesn't thicken up correctly, we will just use it over vanilla ice cream. It finally did thicken and hopefully it is not like a big solid brick of jell. If it is, I'll slice it like canned brown bread and put in on an english muffin!

Here's my advise, if you use pectin for your jams do not add sugar until you've been at a full rolling boil for 1 minute or so first. You want the internal temp to be 220 degrees for the pectin to activate and 'gel' for you after you add the sugar. If you boil too long with the sugar in it will get VERY hard. While its still hot check with a spoon to see if it sheets (drips off the spoon with waves and you can see signs of gel), if it drips like liquid and doesn't make those waves... heat longer.... if it gels instantly and it's REALLY thick on the spoon it may be too hard when it gels. Add some sugar free apple or grape juice 1/2 cup at a time to thin it up a bit.

Enjoy!

 

[Stubbornhillfarm]

vfem, YUM!!! We were having a tough time getting the jam to thicken up last night. I told my husband, if it doesn't thicken up correctly, we will just use it over vanilla ice cream. It finally did thicken and hopefully it is not like a big solid brick of jell. If it is, I'll slice it like canned brown bread and put in on an english muffin!

Here's my advise, if you use pectin for your jams do not add sugar until you've been at a full rolling boil for 1 minute or so first. You want the internal temp to be 220 degrees for the pectin to activate and 'gel' for you after you add the sugar. If you boil too long with the sugar in it will get VERY hard. While its still hot check with a spoon to see if it sheets (drips off the spoon with waves and you can see signs of gel), if it drips like liquid and doesn't make those waves... heat longer.... if it gels instantly and it's REALLY thick on the spoon it may be too hard when it gels. Add some sugar free apple or grape juice 1/2 cup at a time to thin it up a bit.

Enjoy!

I'll let you know how it came out. We used the recipe in the Ball canning book. No pectin, just peaches, water and sugar. I will remember the tip about the pectin and the temp. We kept trying the spoon test and it kept just dripping off. Finally, two drops rolling together, then finaly more of a sheet, but not wavy. And...I will have some sugar free apple juice on hand just in case!

 

[trunkman]

I let my husband do the mashing of the peaches. They were pretty firm still, not quite ripe really but smelled delish cooking.

http://www.theeasygarden.com/forum/uploads/8199_peach_jam_boiling.jpg

This is what we have so far. The peach jam took much longer to cook for some reason before it reached the correct consistancy on the spoon test. It tasted good right out of the pan and looks pretty. We'll see what happens. My husband made two peach cobblers with whole wheat flour last night while I worked on supper. Half of ours is gone already! It was yummy.

http://www.theeasygarden.com/forum/uploads/8199_peach_and_blueberry_jam.jpg

Nice, looks yummy!

 

[NwMtGardener]

Stubbornhillfarm...i would not use anything i got at a florists for food...they use an amzing amount of pesticides and herbicides, and lord knows what else. You could try a different kind of edible flower that you get at a farmers market. Or plant some violets next year

 

[Stubbornhillfarm]

Stubbornhillfarm...i would not use anything i got at a florists for food...they use an amzing amount of pesticides and herbicides, and lord knows what else. You could try a different kind of edible flower that you get at a farmers market. Or plant some violets next year

ooooo....yep, good call! See I knew I asked the question for a reason. I do still have some roses blooming.

 

[Stubbornhillfarm]

The peach jam, although very, very tasty, was too stiff. My husband and I will keep it for ourselves. We spooned some out and I think you could spread it on toast. Definately not on untoasted bread. We will likely heat it up and use it on biscuts or ice cream. I'll try again maybe tonight or tomorrow and see how batch number 2 goes.

 

[vfem]

The peach jam, although very, very tasty, was too stiff. My husband and I will keep it for ourselves. We spooned some out and I think you could spread it on toast. Definately not on untoasted bread. We will likely heat it up and use it on biscuts or ice cream. I'll try again maybe tonight or tomorrow and see how batch number 2 goes.

If you can find it, get a candy thermometer and heat you jam while cooking to only 220 degrees, then you don't have to worry if you got to the gel stage or not. That's the perfect gel temp, only needs to hold at that for 1 minute to know you're good. On the candy thermometer you'll see if you hit 230... you'll get the hard stuff. I rather mine be runny then hard since I put it on everything from ice cream to meat marinade and want it to move around easily.

I do put the over hard stuff in the crock pot as a marinade! Made you could do that with some pork or something and have some spicy peach glazed pork chopped! I got recipes for everything! LOL

 

[Stubbornhillfarm]

If you have extra peaches do yourself a favor and make peach butter. Its in the Blue Ball Book, the variation with the clove, cinnamon, etc. Its SOO good. Takes a while to cook down but its well worth it. We prefer it to any of the peach jams we've tried and its a very simple recipe too. We've already picked 2 peck of peaches to make peach butter with to give you an idea of how much we like that recipe.

And if you want to try another blueberry jam recipe here's one we thats a big hit for us too.

Spiced Blueberry Honey Jam

2 1/2 cups course chopped blueberries

2 1/2 cups granulated sugar

1 cup liquid honey

1 tbsp lemon juice

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

1 pouch liquid fruit pectin

Place blueberries, sugar, honey, lemon juice and nutmeg in large saucepan. Bring to a full boil over high heat and boil hard for 2 minutes stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in pectin. Ladle into hot jars and water bath 10 minutes. Makes 4 cups

That recipe has rich blueberry flavor while not being overly sweet.

And just the thought of peach cobbler has me drooling all over the keyboard

Jarred, we made some peach butter on Sunday. Thanks for the recipe and idea. The first batch was a little loose, but we will try it again I'm sure and maybe cook it a little longer. It was delish anyway!!!

 

[trunkman]

All I can say is M MMMMMMMMMM!