Strawberry Jam - Easy 10 Minute Gift Idea

Make the best homemade strawberry jam in just 10 minutes! This easy, no-pectin jam recipe uses a secret ingredient for the perfect set. Great for scones, cakes or holiday gift giving. I'll also show you the simple canning process that preserves your jam to make it shelf stable!

About This Strawberry Jam

Strawberry jam is one of the easiest jams you can make and when strawberries are cheap and in abundance this is the best way to preserve them. I'm one of those people that cannot resist a bargain with fruit and vegetables. When I saw that strawberries had gone down to $3.50 for 500g/1.1lb for the odd shaped ones, I snapped up 4 boxes because I wanted to make some strawberry jam as Christmas presents. And really who cares about the shape or size of the strawberries when you're just mashing them up! ;)

How to make traditional strawberry jam? You need just three things: strawberries, sugar and lemon juice to make a traditional strawberry jam. I add vanilla because I think it really enhances the flavour of strawberries. I also have a secret ingredient that I use in strawberry jam to help it set without pectin.

My secret weapon for strawberry jam without pectin is: cream of tartar! This helps prevent crystallisation, improves flavour but also helps to convert natural pectin to set better.

Should I add lemon juice to my strawberry jam? Absolutely! Not only does it balance the sweetness of your jam but it also prevents bacteria growing. It also helps the jam set.

Can I reduce the amount of sugar in my jam? Strawberry is a low pectin fruit so it does need more sugar than other fruit. Normally jam is made with 1:1 ratio of fruit to sugar so for every 1kg/2.2lbs of fruit, you use 1kg/2.2lbs of sugar. I like my jams less sweet so I reduce the sugar to 4:3 ratio. Tip: do not go less than a 3:2 fruit to sugar ratio as the sugar is what allows fruit to be preserved.

What to use strawberry jam with? Serve this strawberry jam with clotted cream and scones or fill a sponge cake or donuts with it! Or try making a quick raspberry jam too!

Video How To Make 10 Minute Strawberry Jam

Video: How to Make Strawberry Jam

Ingredients For Strawberry Jam

Strawberries - Make sure to wash these well under cold water and pick out any soft, mushy or discoloured strawberries. Remove all of the green leaves and stem.

White sugar - Good old white sugar works well for jam making. You don't need caster or superfine sugar for this but you can use it.

Lemon juice - Fresh lemon juice or bottled lemon juice works here.

Vanilla - Use vanilla extract, paste or essence here.

Cream of tartar - This is found in the baking aisle (also a pavlova's secret ingredient!)

Tips For Making Strawberry Jam

1 - We mash the strawberries with a potato masher but use a food processor or blender if you want a smoother jam. I love finding those plump bits of strawberry in my jam. Wrap the handle of the potato masher with a tea towel to protect your hands when mashing.

2 - Make sure to use a very large pot. For this quantity below use a 5 litre/5.3 quart pot. The jam mixture can rise up and boil so you need to make sure that your pot won't overflow.

3 - Do not leave cooking jam unattended, especially for the last 5 minutes of cooking. This is the most critical time as you need to stop cooking the jam when you reach the level of liquid that you want.

4 - I use jars without rubber seals and use just a simple jar and metal lid because I sterilise the jars by placing them in the oven and rubber seals melt in the oven. Empty Bonne Maman jars are great.

5 - Skim the scum from the top of the jam right at the end. The scum contains any impurities and will start to form during the first 5 minutes or cooking.

6 - This jam, once canned, will keep on the shelf for up to 1 year. If you don't do the canning process, keep the jam in the fridge for up to 3 months. To give the jam a longer life in the fridge, always use a clean spoon or knife.

I love making and eating strawberry jam and up next you could also try my 3 day strawberry jam (this is the polar opposite of this quick jam in terms of time) and my strawberry and elderflower jam. Or this watermelon, strawberry and rose jam was inspired by the Black Star Pastry watermelon cake.

Easy Strawberry Jam Recipe

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Recipe Overview

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 10-15 minutes

Makes: 4x400g/14oz jars

Ingredients Needed

• 1kg/2.2lbs strawberries, washed and hulled
• 750g/1.6lbs white sugar
• 60ml/2flozs lemon juice
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract or paste
• 1 teaspoon cream of tartar

Step-By-Step Instructions

Step 1 PREP - Place a metal plate in the freezer (to test jam doneness) and place your jars and lid in a 180C/350F oven for 15 minutes to sterilise. Keep the jam jars in the oven so that they're hot.

Step 2 MASH - While the jars are sterilising, place the strawberries in a large 5 litre/5.3quart pot. Mash strawberries well with a potato masher (you can also pulse in a food processor but I like some texture to my jam). Add sugar, lemon juice and vanilla and bring to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes with the lid off.

Step 3 BOIL - Stir in cream of tartar and increase heat and allow to rapidly boil for 4-5 minutes. The amount of time depends on how fast the jam is boiling so take it off the heat when it has the texture that you want. Skim off the scum with a slotted spoon. Test the jam for doneness by taking half a teaspoon of the liquid and drawing a line with it on the frozen metal plate. If the liquid holds and does not merge back together, your jam is ready. If not, cook rapidly for two or three minutes more.

Step 4 JAR - By now the jars and lids should be done and take them out of the oven. With a ladle spoon the hot jam in the hot jars leaving around half an inch gap at the top (jars and jam must be hot to avoid the glass cracking from thermal shock). Wearing oven gloves, screw the lids on tight. I like to place the jars upside down to create a seal.

Step 5 CAN - To preserve the jarsthese so that they can safely be kept at room temperature, place them in a large pot of water, fully immersed. Bring to a boil and boil for 10 minutes. Allow to cool completely and remove jars. The jam should now keep on the shelf for 1 year in a cool, dark place.

Substitution notes:

White sugar can be subbed for caster or superfine sugar. You can also make jam with brown sugar but this will produce a more molasses flavour and darker colour to your jam.

Vanilla extract, essence or paste can be subbed with a scraped vanilla bean pod.

Personal Note

We always have lots of fruit in the house but for this strawberry jam I had to tell Mr NQN to keep his hands off it. He loves fruit and juices and will happily subsist on both entirely if he is allowed to.

We were also having Mr NQN's family over and he just bought two bottles of nice juice. When you find a good juice you look forward to drinking it, especially if you're Mr NQN who just loves the damn stuff.

Usually he'll happily share things with people but not the good juice. About 30 minutes before they arrived, I saw him rifling in the main fridge. He took out the two juices and popped them deep in the back of the second fridge while muttering something to himself.

"What are you doing it?" I asked him.

"I'm hiding the juice!" he said conspiratorially. He knows that his family will often just help themselves to whatever is in the fridge, especially the kids and he did not want his precious juice supply dwindled by these juice gobblers.

And it's true if you offer any Elliott some of your drink your glass will be returned to you empty. At first, I thought this was just Mr NQN but then his sister's fiancé Ben mentioned that Araluen also downs his drinks as if they had just run a marathon and needed rapid hydration.

"Okay, then hide the strawberries too!" I said because jam needed to be made and I could see them also helping themselves to the 4 boxes of strawberries.

So tell me Dear Reader, do you ever hide food from guests? What is your favourite jam flavour?