Eight kids were born to my grandmother. Without a doubt, she developed her ability to use what she had and cook with little ingredients. One of my favorite meals has always been and still is this one, plus it’s quite easy! This goes fantastically with cornbread!
| Prep Time: | 10 mins |
| Cook Time: | 1 hr 45 mins |
| Additional Time: | 30 mins |
| Total Time: | 2 hrs 25 mins |
| Servings: | 24 |
| Yield: | 3 cups |
Ingredients
- 3 apples, stemmed, coarsely chopped (including core and seeds)
- 1 lemon, chopped (including rind and seeds)
- 1 cup water
- 3 pounds fresh strawberries, hulled
- 1 1/2 cups pectin puree
- 2 ¼ cups white sugar, divided
- 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
Instructions
- Place chopped apples, lemon, and water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat; reduce heat to medium. Cover and cook, stirring occasionally, until fruit is very soft and collapsed, about 30 minutes. Remove from heat. Strain through a fine sieve into a bowl to separate the liquid from the pulp and seeds. Press with the back of a wooden spoon or spatula to extract as much liquid as possible. Discard pulp and seeds. You should have about 1 1/2 cups pectin puree. A bit more or less will work fine.
- Place hulled strawberries in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse until berries are pureed, about 1 minute. Transfer to a saucepan. Add strained pectin puree to strawberries. Stir in 1 cup sugar. Bring mixture to a simmer over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium; simmer for about 15 minutes. Skim off foam. Adjust heat, if necessary, to ensure mixture is always simmering without boiling over. Stir in remaining 1 1/4 cup sugar.
- Cook, stirring often, until mixture reaches 220 degrees F (105 degrees C), 50 to 60 minutes. Remove from heat. Whisk in lemon juice.
- Ladle into sterilized canning jars while still hot. Allow to cool to room temperature uncovered. Cover and refrigerate 1 or 2 days before serving to allow sugar and pectin to thicken up the jam.
- Delicious served on
- , biscuits, or anything jam-worthy.
- Here’s Chef John’s recipe for
- .
Reviews
It turned out perfectly. I adjusted the second addition of sugar to my taste as the apples were sweeter than I expected. And I didn’t puree the strawberries first, just small chunks then used the immersion blender at the end.
Delicious jam and the first time i have made my own pectin. Directions worked out great except I did not have to cook as long as recipe said, it was all jammed up after about 25 minutes. I did can mine in boiling water 10 minutes as well.
Delicious!
Wonderful fresh berry flavor. I made it with a 50/50 mix of Blackberries and Raspberries that we found on sale. I added 1/4 c more sugar and it came out perfect.
The consistency and flavor were perfect, specially because of the delicious punch of acidity at the end added by the lemon. I loved that it’s also a much healthier method of making jam. Totally satisfied with my results!
Everyone loves this. I didn’t taste much of the apple but I love the hint of lemon mixed in. I did decrease the sugar to 1.5c. and it was the perfect sweetness for me. It was less thick than I would have liked so I may work with that next time.
I made it twice. I followed the directions the first time with respect to the pectin. Which came out cloudy. It didn’t gel and I thought it was because I reduced the amount of sugar. I did some research on making pectin and the second time I made the pectin a bit different. It came out clear and I made enough to jar for future use. I learned the best kind of apples to use along with some other tips. I used more sugar, but still not the amount the recipe called for. It still didn’t gel like a jam would. However, it is tasty. I have heated it up and put it over ice cream and strawberry cream cheese cobbler or spread it on a bagel. So delicious.
yummmm!!!!
Love this jam but I also add some Hawaiian chili peppers that I grow in it! I usually put about 12 in a batch and it has pretty good heat to it. Might be too spicy for people who don’t like spicy. Yummy strawberry with a kick of spice. Me and my bf’s favorite jam!
Made this with apricots instead and it is great! Besides this change, I used half the amount of sugar, and manually crushed the apricots with a spoon while cooking. I prefer my jams/preserves not to be too sweet. Even with the reduced sugar, my jam still seemed a bit too sweet to me, but that may be because I used 1 honeycrisp apple, 1 gala apple, and 1 fugi apple – they are sweeter apples. I plan on trying this with rhubarb next 🙂
OMG!. This jam turned out spectacularly delicious! I love the spreadable texture. I had too many strawberries that couldn’t be eaten up before spoiling so I decided to make this recipe. Other websites recipes called for pectin. I said, “What is pectin?” That gives you an idea of how much I don’t know about making jam! Chef John’s recipe only used apples and a lemon to make fresh pectin. Well I had those items on hand! I don’t have canning jars around the house, so I used a few pickle jars that I had washed out and set aside last year for the hubby who often asks for something to store nails, paint, screws etc. I boiled the jars and lids to sterilize them before pouring my strawberry jam into them. I put the sealed jars of jam into the simmering water for 20 minutes. I removed the jars and let them cool on the counter. You could hear the jars seal themselves with a little suction sound as everything cooled down. I removed the jars and let them cool on the counter. You could hear the jars seal themselves with a suction sound as everything cooled down. My husband loves jam and I know this batch will go fast!
This recipe is so delicious and fresh! This is my first time making jam and I enjoy that it isn’t so sugary like store bought. I poured the mixture into a measuring jug after it was done and it yeilded surprisingly an exact 3 cups of jam. I would definitely make it again and I can’t wait to use this jam on more toast and in pastries! I followed the recipe exactly as Chef John described although I did not need to boil the apples and lemon for as long as he said. Maybe my stove is too hot at medium heat, I wasn’t using the correct pan, or I was just not paying enough attention to adjust the heat better. Either way–at 15 minutes in, it started to burn at the bottom and make everything look like applesauce which couldn’t be strained through my mesh strainer. Instead of starting over–which I should have done, but didn’t have the apples or lemons for–I just put the weird applesauce back in the pot with another cup of water and heated it up for a few minutes. Regardless of my mess up, I think I was still able to create pectin and the jam tastes right which is the most important part of it all!!
I have made strawberry jam in the past and it came out watery the homemade pectin was the trick. You must be a diligent stirrer with this recipe or else you’ll ruin the bottom of your pot. So happy with this recipe, I will totally make it again, thanks Chef John!
Can you a bottle this jam??
Very good Strawberry flavor. But came out very runny, more like a strawberry sauce. I think I’ll go back to my old recipe.
I’ve made this jam several times and it turns out awesome every time. I prefer this jam over store bought and wouldn’t go back. This recipe was also super easy to follow. Thanks chef John
I made this this weekend. I used just under 2 lbs of strawberries so I reduced my pectin puree to 2 apples and 2/3 strawberry. I also only used a total of 1 cup of sugar (it’s for my kids so I didn’t mind it being a little less sweet). It was still so sweet and delicious. I was afraid I’d screwed up along the way but the recipe was so easy to follow that the end results were spectacular. I would like clarification of whether this has to be refrigerated or if it can be stored in a pantry.
This was the first jam I’ve made it it turned out great. I went the whole way and made the pectin myself and I think it was for the best as it gave it a more fruity and tangy flavor.
Very easy recipe and results are delicious! I halved it to make sure I liked it and will be doing it again with about 10 pounds of fresh strawberries today. Mine reached about 217 degrees when I removed it from heat and was a nice spreadable consistency! Thank you for this great recipe!
This is hands down the best strawberry jam I’ve ever tasted. It really does taste just like fresh strawberries. I’m a believer, Chef John!!