Strawberry Jam, Man.

It's the last day of my stay-cation, and things have been pretty awesome. We've baked, we've cooked, we've even made pasta! We also cleaned the floor when we were finished, so our feet wouldn't become black. Funny how baking with two toddlers makes for an extremely dirty floor. Most importantly, I spent  four whole days with my family! So in this spirit, Chef Blackheart decided, on the last night of my vacation, to make strawberry jam, instead of being lazy on the couch and possible watching that netflix movie we have. So here we go again, laughs, cries, and snoring from the monitor. Time to make some jelly! Just letting you know, you will be getting homemade items for Christmas. We're just perfecting it, so you'll look forward to our homemade jelly, instead of being, "They got us homemade jelly?"


What you'll need:


2 pints hulled strawberries
1 3/4 tbsp of dry fruit pectin (or half a pkg.)
1/4 tsp of butter
3.5 cups sugar


Tools needed:


medium sauce pan
potato masher
measuring cup
knife for hulling the strawberries
large spoon
canning debubbler
5-6 canning jars with lids (We used Ball)

Canning items needed (We are just using the boiling method, we don't own a canner):

extra large pot
medium pot
canning tongs
water


I think I should go to sleep, I can feel spelling mistakes and bad grammar coming on. It's like third grade all over again. Let's not joke, eleventh grade, and if it weren't for spell check, who knows how I would make it through one email, much less a presentation. Alas, Chef Blackheart refuses to blog, and twists my arm to finish documenting his masterpieces.

Enough complaining, let's get to work.

1. For those of you in Houston March 2012, go buy strawberries! This year's crop is overflowing, so prices are low and quality is good! I got strawberries for $1.77 a pint today. (That was 25 cents less than yesterday.) And they are delicious!

OK, no really I'm going to start now.

1. a) Put 1 cup of your hulled strawberries into an 8 quart heavy kettle (or in our case pot) and mash them with your potato masher.

2. Continue to add berries until you have 2 1/2 cups crushed berries.

Give this part to your kids or your stressed out spouse, teenager, sister, neighbor, or just relieve some stress for yourself.

 3. Stir in pectin

4. Stir in butter (Chef Blackheart melted so he could measure out a 1/4 tsp)

5. Heat on high, stirring constantly, until it comes to a full rolling boil.

6. Add sugar all at once. (It's late and Chef Blackheart's hands were full, so no pictures for you... of sugar.)

7. Return to boil

8. Boil 1 minute while stirring

9. Remove from heat and skim the foam off the top with a metal spoon.

10. Boil or submerge canning jars in hot water

11. Ladle at at once into 1/2 pint (sterilized) canning jars. This is much easier if you have a funnel. We ended up with 5 jars. Also de-bubble the jam now if you feel like it's necessary. It was not necessary for us.

12. Leave 1/4" head-space in the jars

13. Wipe jars, hand tighten lids

14. Process in "water boiling canner" or a large pot

Large pot canning instructions for Ball Canning Jars and Lids

What you'll need:

extra large pot
medium pot
canning tongs
water

1. Boil water in both the extra large pot and the medium pot

2. Place jars into the extra large pot of boiling water. If the water doesn't cover the jars by about 1" add water from the medium pot to get the water to the correct height.

3. Place "lid on the pot with jars

4. Let it process for 5 minutes

5. Remove with canning tongs

6. Let them cool on a rack. (We let them cool overnight.)

Ok, on a side note, we were talking to Granny today, and she questioned how much was all of this costing us. Wel,l not anymore than regular food. She begs to differ, so I've decided to post the estimated (% of item used) price of our completed projects.

Here's the money
Pint of strawberries (2)- $3.54
Pectin (1/100 of the bottle) - $ 0.04
Sugar (1/4 of the bag) - $0.22
1/4 teaspoon of butter $0.05
Canning jars (One time expense- pack of replacement lids are $0.77) - $2.90

Total price for 5 jars of homemade jam - $6.75

And considering HEB jam is about $1.80 a jar. We SAVED approximaely $2.25. Hey the saying goes, every penny saved is a penny earned. And if we had already had the jars, the whole thing would have cost us $3.91. So, sometimes it is cheaper to make it yourself.