Homemade Strawberry Jam {Fun Weekend Activity!}

We love strawberries, and have been wanting to try our hand at making our own jam.

So, I grabbed my best kitchen helper and we had a lot of fun the other afternoon!

Making your own Homemade Strawberry Jam is fairly easy…and is so much better than store bought.

I won’t go into “How to Can”…there are so many great sites out there that will explain that to you….but here are the basic canning supplies that you will need to make this recipe:

Large canning pot with a rack inside

Large-mouth funnel

12 8 oz. canning jars with screw-on rings

Canning tongs

If you don’t want to have to purchase these items…..it will probably be easy to find someone to borrow them from; and maybe even share the jam!

Here’s what you need:

5 pints of hulled strawberries

6 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 1/2 packages of fruit pectin (powdered)

10 1/2 cups of sugar

Here’s How Ya Do It:

Using a potato masher…mash all the strawberries really well, but leave some chunks. Throw them into a pot and add the lemon juice and bring them to a boil.

Add in the fruit pectin and stir to combine all the yumminess really well.

Add the sugar all at one time and stir to combine.

Bring all this great scrumptiousness to a hard boil and let it boil for 1 minute 25 seconds.

Turn it off and skim off any foam that has formed on the top.

Using the wide-mouth funnel fill each jar to within 1/4″ from the top.

Follow canning instructions to give your lovely jars a water bath.

Remove jars from their bath and allow to sit somewhere undisturbed for 24 hours.

It is so fun to hear the jars *pop*, which means they have sealed correctly. From all over the house the day we did this everyone would be listening for *pops* and say “Oh! There goes another one!” It became very comical.

After 24 hours test each jar by pushing down on the center of the top to make sure that it sealed properly. {It should not ‘give’ when you push down on it.}

If any of your jars don’t seal correctly…go ahead and put them in the fridge and use them within a few weeks.

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What are you doing this weekend? We are headed to the drive-in to see “Brave”! Our kids have never been to a drive-in…so we are excited. {Of course we are going to be having a heat wave this weekend….over 100. We might have to borrow our friends’ car pluggy-thingy-majiggy that enables you to plug in things like FANS! } If I melt…..it’s been nice knowing you.