MisterH 31 August 2011 11:12

I don't know if I got something wrong, but I followed the recipe and I reckon 4KG of Crab apples is an awful LOT - it's like a whole shopping bag full. Een after washing and trimming, I filled a huge stock-pot nealry to the brim and ended up with about 3Kg of juice. After adding 3Kg of sugar I made 12 jars of jelly after 3x5 mins at a rolling boil to achieve a set. I added a heaped desert spoon of glucose at the second stage to offset the fructose from the fruit, I believe this can help prevent crystallisation (from syrup recipes) I can't find a supplier that sells jam jars so I buy the cheapest 'mixed fruit' jam I can find in the supermarket and chuck the contents away - it costs about 29p a jar (cheaper than online suppliers) and the nice thing is, the best-before date is usually pretty accurate, although I have jars of jam I made 3 or 4 years ago in the cupboard which are still good. I have some general tips for anyone making jam for the first time; SAFETY FIRST: Beware: boiling fruit and jam will foam and increase in volume significantly - especially at the rolling boil stage - try to avoid more than half-filling your saucepan, jam kettle or stock pot to avoid boiling-over and a big sticky mess. It's better to do two batches than risk chaos and calamity that might put you off ever trying to make jam again. Stir gently - vigorous stirring can cause the mixture to suddenly erupt. WARNING: If you are using a gas hob NEVER leave jam or fruit boiling unattended - even if it looks like it is going to take a while. In the event the liquid does boil over it will almost certainly put the flame out and your house will slowly fill with gas. D A N G E R: Jam syrup is extremely hot, treat it like lava and keep kids/pets away when boiling and potting up. GENERAL ADVICE: Pour off some of the water before boiling the fruit for the first time - I only had about 80% submerged - when the fruit at the bottom begins to soften, the stuff on top will sink into the liquid and you will save time and energy not boiling off that excess water later on. Don't worry that the resulting mass from boiling the fruit looks a pale orange colour - the juice will be a rosy pink and the jam will be a lovely red colour, don't panic - persevere. It may help to strain the fruit pulp in two stages; Press it through a colander first before straining it in your jelly bag - this removes the big lumps of skin and seeds from the mass which also reduces the volume and weight of pulp hanging overnight. Make sure you have your jars and lids sterilised and dry before you begin boiling the jam at the last stage - there's nothing like having the jam ready to store and then realising you have no sterile jars to put it in. Keep a low heat under the jam once you have achieved a set or it will start to solidify in the pot as it cools! Avoid messy funnels and ladles, take a tip from my mother-in-law and use a glass measuring jug to scoop out the jam from your pot and get it into the jars with less mess and fuss. I noticed when testing for the set that the plate from the freezer was getting condensation on it and this was affecting the jam I was trying to test - wipe the plate dry with a tea-towel before blobbing the jam on or try testing in another room if your kitchen is quite foisty as a result of all the boiling. Keep a record of the weights at each stage if possible - this way you can work out how much water evaporated off in the final boil and determine the fruit content of your finished product - mine was about 45% fruit (including the fruit sugars) and 55% added sugar in the end. I think 90 minutes total time is a bit optimistic - If you include the time taken to pick, wash and prepare the fruit and sterilising jars etc - you're looking at a good couple of hours over 2 days - make sure you have the whole weekend free and take your time. Making jam is FUN!

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helc 12 September 2010 20:36

I'm eating jelly made in 2004 - wonderful!! I think it improves with age, kept in cool dark cupboard.

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JHV 05 September 2010 22:44

The recipe worked very well - thank you - but for 4kg crab apples I needed twice the amount of sugar you suggested. Perhaps you should say 'approx' to give some leeway.

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John F 30 August 2009 15:14

The query about the measure -7 parts to 10 parts... It is the same weight for weight or volume for volume, so long as you use the same measure for each of the ingredients involved it doesn't matter which you use. As for the conundrum about boiling to a set, the principle used in determining when a set has happened is really a very simple one. A set is reliably achieved when the Jam mix has been boiled long enough to have reached a temperature of 105 degrees celsius. To get to this temperature, a certain amount of water has to have been bolied out of the mixture you have extracted such that the ratio of cooked sugars to water is such that the mix left, is sufficiently of sugar and or fruit pulp, for its boiling point to have been raised by approximately 5 degrees over the boiling point of water. Obviously if you use less water in the mix, the less you will have to boil away and the quicker you will get to the setting point. To test for a set you can either use a specific jam thermometer, an electronic temperature probe for food use, with a temperature scale which goes at least as far as 105 degrees celsius or, you can use the 'spoon and plate method' All are equally valid. Obviously the results from using the 'spoon and plate method' are open to a wide margin of interpretation but one way of being more certain with this methid is, if you push your finger into the blob of jam on the plate, sometime after it has cooled (about a minute) and you see wrinkles forming in the surface of the blob as you push it, you have a set and can stop the boil.

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giapetto 27 October 2008 10:20

I'm not sure why this recipe calls for such long boiling. 30 minutes plus will tend to darken the colour, and my experience (confirmed yesterday with a load of windfalls)is that 5 - 10 minutes is quite enough to get a good set. Even if it fails the spoon test, it still sets very well after 24 hours in the jar. 7:10 sugar : juice is a bit sour for my taste; most people will find that 1:1 is nicer. Maybe what all this proves is that there aren't any rules!

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