Cookbook:Jam (recipe)

Jam (recipe)
Category	Fruit recipes
Difficulty

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Ingredients

• 2 cups soft, fleshy fruit like strawberries, peaches, cherries, plums, blueberries, blackberries, raspberries, etc.
• ¼ cup or less lemon juice
• ½ teaspoon of butter
• 1 cup white granulated sugar (or 3 cups for bitter or sour fruits)
• Pectin (optional)

Procedure

1. Clean the fruit, remove any stones, leaves, or other inedible parts, and wash it. If the fruit is not a small berry, then cut it up into small pieces.
2. Crush the fruit, then sprinkle with lemon juice and butter and stir well.
3. Pour the mixture into a sufficiently large cooking pot. Traditionally a copper pot is used, but any other cooking pot will do fine.
4. Bring the mixture slowly to the boil on a full rolling boil, stirring regularly. Pour in sugar, and add pectin if needed.
5. Depending on the fruit, you will need to boil the mixture for about an hour. The jam is ready when it is thick enough. Check this by pouring a drop of the jam onto a cold plate. It should turn sticky and not be too runny.
6. To preserve the jam well, you should pour it into glass flasks or containers that have been sterilized by boiling them in water. You can also pasteurize the containers by washing them with boiling water. The inside of lids as well as the flasks should be washed if the latter method is used. The jam should be poured rapidly into the still-hot containers. The containers should be sealed with lids. In this case it's best to let the air bubble that is in the flask traverse the still-hot jam by turning it upside-down after the lid has been placed on. This is to disinfect the air bubble. Or, instead of a lid, the jam can be protected by pouring molten paraffin on top of it, and closing of the jar with a paper that is held with a rubber band.
7. Serve with bread, toast, English muffins, or pancakes.