At the height of the summer fruit season, let us remember that not only jam, but also other sweet twists can be made from them at home.
For example, it is difficult to come up with a more tasty treat of universal use than a viscous and transparent strawberry jam made from fresh berries with your own hands. We hasten to reassure those who believe that it is more difficult and longer to cook than jam - in fact, the opposite is true, and the result is excellent!
Before talking about how to make delicious strawberry jam at home and suggest interesting recipes, let's make it clear what this delicacy is.
Unlike jam, which needs to be boiled gradually for several hours so that the berries remain intact, jam is an almost homogeneous jelly-like mass consisting of syrup and softened fruits.
It is much easier to cook it than jam, besides, it is a more economical option for winter sweet preparation, since not only selected berries can be safely used as raw materials, but also re-grading - small fruits in varying degrees of ripeness and even slightly crushed (but not spoiled! ).
Another significant difference between strawberry jam and homemade jam is that it is made quickly, literally in a matter of minutes. Below we offer a variant of the recipe for strawberry jam "5 minutes" and practical advice on how to make a delicious homemade twist from the favorite berry.
This recipe will certainly appeal to all fans of healthy eating. You need a little sugar to get a treat, it will be enriched with "immune" vitamin C. It is brewed for only 5 minutes, which means it retains almost all the useful components.
Quick strawberry jam according to this original recipe does not last long - a maximum of a month. But it turns out to be so aromatic and tasty (moderately sweet) that it is usually eaten first of all homemade twists. Crispy toast with a spoonful of tender strawberry mass is the best start to the day!
We lay out the treat on sterilized jars while still hot. And so that the fragile glass does not crack under the influence of high temperature, you need to put a clean spoon in each container - the metal will take over the temperature. Before rolling up the lids, the spoons must be removed.
This recipe is very easy to make homemade strawberry jam. It has been stored under a tin lid for more than one year and tastes much better than the store one.
The amount of sugar offered in this recipe can be increased to your liking. It is undesirable to put it less, because sugar is not only a flavoring additive, but also an excellent preservative.
If you plan to store the workpiece in the refrigerator, plastic lids will come off, but if in the basement or on a shelf at home, it is better to roll up a tin can. Such jam can be stored even all winter. True, it is hardly worth it until spring - it turns out very tasty.
If the berry garden has pleased you with an unprecedented harvest, and there is still enough free space on the shelves in your home cellar, you should definitely try to prepare a delicacy that is very popular in Europe and half-forgotten in our country.
Having learned from our post about some secrets of how to make ordinary strawberry jam incredibly tasty, you just have to collect or buy the right amount of fresh berries. It is best to take sweet fruits - then you will have to put less sugar, and the treat from the jar will turn out to be as useful as possible!
What to make jam from
Jam is brewed from fruits and berries, choosing mainly based on the season. In May, they make jams from apricots and strawberries. In June, jams of currants (red and black) and cherries, strawberries are cooked. In the middle of summer, they begin to cook from raspberries, apples and plums. In August and early September, jams are made from apples, lingonberries, gooseberries, hawthorns. As a rule, each of the stages of the fruitful season has its own "golden" time, when you can buy fruits and berries at a very low price in the market or in the villages. Especially if a good harvest will be given at a big discount, just to get rid of poorly stored products.
How much jam to cook
Depending on the type of fruit and juiciness, the preparation time can take up to a day, and the cooking time will be 15-25 minutes.
Whether to add pectin (agar-agar, gelatin)
The main "highlight" of the jam is its pleasant jelly structure, thanks to which the jam is moderately sweet and high in calories. Therefore, in general cases, pectin comes in handy.
Natural pectin is found in apples and apricots, gooseberries, plums and currants. However, when cooking, keep in mind that jam made from them without pectin in powder will need to be boiled for a rather long time and it will turn out to be very concentrated.
How to make jam - general rules
1. Wash the fruits and shake slightly in a colander to get rid of excess moisture. The bones, if any, should be removed.
2. Cover with sugar, and wait 1-8 hours, depending on the type of fruit, so that they give juice.
3. Prepare the gelling component: for example, the gelatin should be diluted with water and heated (the exact recipe depends on the type of gelatin). 4. Rub the fruits through a sieve, remove the skin, put the mixture in a saucepan and boil for 10 minutes.
5. Pour in the pectin, mix thoroughly, turn off the heat when boiling.
What to add to jam
First, when making jam, you can combine fruits and berries with each other. In any jam, citric acid and of course spices will be appropriate - star anise, cardamom, cinnamon, cloves.
You can add nuts to the jam - almonds or walnuts. From dried fruits, you can add raisins or prunes.
The delicious Assorti berry jam is very easy to make at home. Just a few simple manipulations in the kitchen will need to be done by the hostess in order to end up with a delicious sweet preparation for the winter. The cooking time will surprise even lazy people, just three minutes, and the jam will be ready! All relatives and friends will be able to enjoy berry jam in winter. Bright colors of summer will be hidden in delicious jars with blanks!
Would need:
For jam, it is best to use berries that have just been removed from the branch. Since, it is in such products that the most useful properties are. If the berry is clean, then it is not necessary to wash it, because it is the natural bloom that contributes to the good density of the finished product. If the berries are purchased, you need to rinse them under running water and dry them on cloth towels.
For jam made according to the recipe given here, any berries are suitable, for example, black currant:
Mash the berry well with a spoon. A meat grinder or blender will greatly facilitate the work.
The remaining cake from berries can be used for baking, compote.
We turn to the preparation for the preparation of jam. Jars and lids should be thoroughly washed using natural cleaning agents such as baking soda. Rinse thoroughly under running water. Sterilize in any convenient way - over steam, in the microwave or oven. The latter method is preferable for such a jam.
The next stage - you need to pour the resulting berry mixture into a saucepan in which the jam will be cooked, add, stir everything thoroughly.
Bring the berry puree to a boil.
After the mass begins to boil, add sugar to the pan. Stir everything thoroughly with a spoon until the granulated sugar grains dissolve.
Put the pot back on the stove and let the mixture boil. Boil the jam for three minutes, stir during cooking so that it does not burn.
Pour berry jam into clean dry jars and roll up. In a couple of hours the jam will be incredibly thick!
Collected fruits - berries and decided to make delicious jam for the winter? Simple and proven by many housewives recipes for such sweet preparations, with photographs and step-by-step instructions, will help you in cooking. Using detailed recipes with photos - sweet treats from berries, fruits and even vegetables at home can be prepared quickly and easily, and the jam will come out thick and uniform.
Delicious homemade jams are a healthy treat for tea, a ready-made pie filling or an ingredient for gourmet desserts. This section contains the best recipes that experienced housewives and beginners can handle.
Cherry plum belongs to the plum family, and looks very similar to them. The colors of the fruits can be very diverse: yellow, burgundy, red and even green. Inside the cherry plum there is a large drupe, which in most varieties is very poorly separated from the pulp. The taste of the fruits is rather sour, but this does not prevent you from preparing amazing dessert dishes from them. One of them is jam. Today we will try to understand all the intricacies of the process of preparing this delicacy at home.
Preserves and jams - these are fruit, berry, and sometimes even vegetable delicacies cooked in a sweet environment (sugar or sweetener, honey, molasses). In addition, sometimes nuts and edible flowers can be the main ingredient in such a delicious dish.
Preserves and jams are a sweet kind of preservation, the preservation of which for a long period of time is ensured by sugar added in significant quantities. Thanks to this component, the protoplasm of harmful microorganisms is dehydrated, respectively, they cannot multiply and the product does not deteriorate.
What is the difference between jam and jam? These two varieties of sweet canning are combined into a general category of candied products. This means that the principle of recipes for both types is to increase the amount of sugar in the canned product and reduce the water content. However, in the jam, the raw materials should not lose their shape. This is achieved by means of certain procedures (aging of fruits in syrup, boiling of raw materials in several approaches, etc.). Jam, unlike jam, can have a puree structure. Keeping the fruit in shape is optional. Another difference between the two types of sweet preservation is that syrup in jam can be liquid, but in jam it must certainly be jelly-like. In addition, jam is a designation of a primordially Russian delicacy, while jam refers to traditional English cuisine.
It is not so difficult at home to prepare the "right" jam with thick transparent syrup, in which the fruits are firmly held, without settling to the bottom of the jar and not floating to the surface! It is important to adhere to the technology of recipes for their preparation and not deviate from it a single step!
Homemade jam should be prepared, taking into account the following recommendations:
The readiness of the jam is assessed not by the duration of its cooking indicated in the recipe, but by certain characteristics:
You can check the readiness of the jam in this way: a drop of syrup is dripped onto the index finger, then the index finger is connected to the thumb, after which they are bred. As a result, a tearing thread should form between the fingers. Its fragility indicates that the jam has been digested. But the thread is completely absent only in undercooked jam.
Making the “right” jam is many times easier than making the “right” jam, since the fruits in it do not have to be kept in full condition. By the way, for the same reason, recipes for making jams allow the use of mechanically damaged fruits.
Almost any fruit and berry can be used to make jams, but those that contain a lot of pectin and a sufficient amount of acid are best suited. Such requirements, for example, are met by quince, gooseberries, plums, apples. All other fruits can also be used, but in this case, it is necessary to add gooseberry or applesauce to them, which will have a gelling effect on the jam (perhaps due to the content in them of a large amount of the same pectin).
Preparing fruit for making jams is the same as for making jam. Some recipes still offer an additional procedure. So, cranberries, gooseberries and currants are additionally kneaded so that these berries can be better saturated with sugar.
Fruits prepared for jam are covered with sugar or poured with sugar syrup, and then boiled until tender. The readiness of this delicacy can be determined due to the fact that the pieces of the fruit become translucent, and the foam collects in the center.
Homemade jam is sealed hot and always in pre-sterilized jars.
The required amount of sugar for certain fruits and berries is different. Let's indicate the correct proportions for some of them:
Jams and jams are wonderful treats that can be prepared for the winter. Incredibly tasty and at the same time very useful, in winter they become the most valuable find. Although there are some peculiarities in the preparation of both preserves and jams, it is still worth taking on their creation. In winter, your household will be very grateful to you for the time and effort spent in the summer.
If you have never cooked preserves and jams, or you are looking for a new original recipe, then you definitely need to study this section. In it you can find a lot of "goodies" with detailed home cooking technology. In addition to textual descriptions, the recipes also contain step-by-step photos that illustrate in detail the entire cooking process. Even newcomers to cooking using such recipes will be able to easily cook delicious jam or jam.