Homemade Strawberry Jam

Homemade strawberry jam

I haven’t posted in a while, because it’s been kind of crazy and stressful here. Within the past month, we’ve put our condo on the market (hasn’t sold yet), put an offer on a single family house in the city, and decided to switch our kids from their excellent but pricy private religious school to a highly regarded public school. Whew, that’s a lot of changes!

My kids have learned so much this year, it’s amazing. In second grade, my older daughter learned about pioneers. As part of the unit, they wrote a newspaper called “Pioneer Times.” She was so proud to be working on a newspaper just like her Mom did, and she was thrilled to test the recipe for strawberry jam.

The class recipe for “Yummy Jam” comes right in time for peak strawberry season, and, of course, it’s naturally gluten-free. Strawberries are plentiful now (Costco even has huge containers of organic strawberries), so you won’t be breaking the bank to use four cups of berries for this recipe.

“Do you want to hear about a deeeeeeeeeelicious strawberry jam? Here’s how we do it,” the Room 204 pioneers write.

Homemade Strawberry Jam

(gluten-free, dairy-free, pareve, kid-friendly)
By Gluten-Free Nosh
printable recipe

Ingredients:

4 cups strawberries, hulled and quartered
3 cups sugar
2 large Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and diced

Method:

1. Put all ingredients in a medium pot and bring to a boil, watching carefully. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer (so there are tiny bubbles on the surface) for one hour, stirring occasionally.
2. Transfer mixture to a blender and puree until smooth. To prevent spattering hot jam, work with small batches and use a potholder to hold the blender lid tightly closed.
3. Return mixture to pot and simmer for 30 minutes more.
4. Allow jam to cool, then store, covered, in the refrigerator.

Yield: 2 to 3 cups of jam

Note: For canning standards, see USDA Principles of Home Canning. Making the jam was easy, but, wow, the USDA’s canning guidelines seem complicated. I did not use their standards, but I thought they were interesting, nonetheless.