Before going strawberry picking, I knew for sure that I would want to make jam because we eat a lot of pbj at our house. Last year I made raspberry jam, but Jonathan doesn’t like raspberries, so he requested some strawberry jam and I was happy to comply.
When we got home with our 33 lbs. of berries we immediately started hulling and washing, hulling and washing,hulling and … you get the idea. Then I tried chopping them in our magic bullet but it just came out pureed, which was a little too soupy for our jam.
So, I decided to make popsicles with the pureed berries.
I tried using the potato masher to mash the berries for the jam and that worked good. I was able to get some helpers with that too. Then I realized, that I had forgotten to buy pectin. So, off to the store we went.
I bought 5 boxes and stocked up on sugar. (I just followed the recipe in the box for freezer jam.) I eventually had to send Jonathan out to get me more pectin and some additional jars. About 10 boxes of pectin later I finished the jam. I’m thinking it will last until next strawberry season. And it has to be said, fresh strawberry jam is SO much better than any store bought!
I still had about 12 lbs of strawberries left.
Average Housewife 