Homemade Strawberry Jam

Today I bring you my favorite jam recipe, the homemade strawberry jam recipe that I love most and that drives my children crazy too. It is really simple to make, but the intention of today's post is precisely to encourage you to start making your own jam if you don't yet, because it's well worth it.

Once you start making your own jam at home, there's no stopping. It's easy, it's quick, you make sure you know well the ingredients you use and you know that, far from using flavorings, chemical preservatives and undesirable sweeteners, you lovingly choose the fruit and ingredients you add. You can make 100% natural jam and homemade in an hour (And it tastes amazing!).

How to start making jam? I recommend you start with the jam flavors you enjoy most, which are usually peach jam, strawberry jam, fig jam or mixed berry jam. A safe bet in all cases!

That's why I'm bringing you the strawberry jam recipe we always make at home. It's delicious and, in fact, besides using it as jam on toast, you'll want to use it to accompany pastries and scones, with ice cream, to have with yogurt, with panna cotta... Or you'll eat it by the spoonful like I do when you can't see me!

Ingredients

• 450 gr of strawberries
• 50 gr of white sugar
• 125 gr of brown sugar
• The juice of 1/2 lemon, squeezed
• 1 cc of ground cinnamon or a cinnamon stick

Preparation

1. Remove the stem from the strawberries, wash them and cut the strawberries very small. Keep in mind that they break down a lot during cooking, so if you don't like finding lumps in the jam, cut the strawberries very small; if you don't mind lumps, you can cut them without thinking too much, into quarters.
2. Add all the ingredients (strawberries, sugars, lemon juice, and cinnamon) in a large Shallow Casserole or in a casserole and turn on the heat. Start on medium heat at first; you can lower it during cooking.
3. Mix all the ingredients well and let them cook, and let the pectin in the lemon juice react with the sugars, so that everything can join together and end up forming a gel-like texture (which will be noticeable when it cools). Keep stirring constantly.
4. After one hour you'll have the jam ready. Take it out of the casserole, put it into the airtight jars if you are going to vacuum seal them to make your preserves or put them into some lidded container if you are going to consume it in the following days. In that case, let it cool slightly, cover it and put it in the refrigerator.

Making jam in a bread maker

*If you have a bread maker, put the ingredients in the pan and turn on the jam program if it has one (program number 15 in the case of the Moulinex bread maker). The program will last one hour and will take care of mixing for you. After an hour, remove the jam from the pan and distribute it into jars.

Notes

• I love using brown sugar; it pairs fabulously well with strawberries and cinnamon. If you can, use brown sugar with rich woody and aromatic aromas - you get exquisite jams. Using panela is also a hit!
• I use cinnamon sticks or ground cinnamon interchangeably, I love it. And if I use it powdered I don't skimp, I add a dessert spoon (it goes so well with the flavor of roasted strawberries). But you should adapt the recipe to your tastes and preferences - you can omit cinnamon if you don't like it while following the same recipe.
• When you take it out of the bread maker or the pot it will be very hot and liquid. Let it cool and taste it with a spoon - you'll see how delicious it is and you'll surely imagine, at that point, all the delicious desserts it can accompany. As it cools it will gain consistency.
• After taking it out of the pot you can mix it vigorously to break the strawberries down a bit more, if there are pieces larger than you want, but I don't recommend blending it - it would become extremely liquid, and you'll see that when it cools, without blending, it's fabulous.
• The jam will keep for about ten days easily, well closed and always in the fridge.
• The usual theory for making jam is to add half the weight of the fruit in sugar (400gr of strawberries would imply 200 gr of sugar). As you can see I use a bit less, and I use cane sugar, which is less sweet. I love it this way, but you can adapt the recipe to your taste: use only white sugar, add more or less... With a few trials you'll find your favorite combination.
• You can substitute the strawberries for figs, peaches, plums, cherries... The recipe you should follow is exactly the same to obtain a delicious jam.