Freezer jam!

Check out what Kim and I made this morning!!!

Now that I have more time at home and feel generally much less stressed than my teaching days, I have been eager to learn & try out new things--especially in the kitchen. In reading other blogs and getting ideas, I discovered that you can make freezer jam. How cool! It's like baby steps to canning. :)

Kim has been doing freezer cooking for quite awhile and I have been doing a little here and there, but am ready to get serious (we hopefully are buying an additional freezer this weekend). So, we both decided this was something we wanted to try. Sprouts (a local 'health food' store w/ great produce) had peaches on sale--3lbs for $1!! So, peach jam it is!

Aside from the fruit, the only other thing I needed to get was pectin. I wasn't sure that Sprouts would carry it, but was pleasantly surprised to find some. They only carried one kind and it wasn't a brand that I had heard of in other recipes, but it had low sugar options which I was excited about. So, between that and not wanting to load the boys up to make another stop, I decided to get it. In looking at the directions, I was a little nervous because they were different than everything I was reading, but it turned out great!!!

We turned all these....

into all that...

using this wonderful stuff....

Unlike with the other types of pectin listed in other recipes I've seen, this Pomona's Universal Pectin doesn't require the crazy high amounts of sugar (like 4-5 CUPS per recipe)!!!

We made one batch of peach jam and one of peach-pineapple jam. Both are SO yummy and there is less than 1/4 C of sugar in all those jars!!

Here's our 'recipe':

Peach jam

just slightly over 4 C mashed peaches (boiled for 2 minutes)

1/4 C lemon juice

1/4 C agave nectar

1/4 C granulated sugar

3/4 C water (boiled and blended with 4t pectin + 6-7t calcium water)

Peach-pineapple jam

1 8oz can crushed pineapple drained

just under 4 C mashed peaches

just under 1/4 C lemon juice

1/2 C honey

3/4 C water (boiled and blended with 4t pectin + 5t calcium water)

So, there you have it!

3 cheers for freezer jam...

1. It's quick & easy--

Many freezer jams are ideal because they don't require any cooking. Peaches apparently don't do quite as well raw as some others, so we did have cooking time involved--but it was very minimal (like 2 minutes). We managed to crank out the two batches in less than 2 hours--pretty good considering it was our first jamming adventure and we had the three littles to look after too. And, speaking of ease, you don't even need canning jars! Any little freeze-able container will do.

2. It's better for you--

fresh fruit, lower calories, less sugar, no high fructose corn syrup (and we can experiment with a variety of things you can't get in the store....we want to try kiwi-pineapple, mango, etc.)

3. It's less expensive--

Good jams & jellies are rarely on-sale and even then, it seems like it's never for less than $3.50/ 16 oz. jar--and the 'healthier'/low-sugar options not only cost more, but come in smaller sizes. We got our peaches & pectin for about $6.50. So for a little more than $3 a piece, we each have around 40 ounces of jam which goes in the freezer and will keep for a year!

Totally awesome!!

This is definitely the first of many freezer jam adventures to come! Now, to place an order for a bulk supply of universal pectin and get some more containers (plastics and the old-fashioned, cute, jam jars!)...