This isn’t so much an “official” recipe but a way to remember what I did when I made raspberry jam. I’m still learning how to make low sugar, no pectin jams. This summer I tried to pick raspberries at one of the many U-Pick farms, but we had such a bizarre growing season this year that it’s amazing we got anything from the gardens. My mother-in-law was able to find some really delicious raspberries and I’m finally getting around to making jam with them. The raspberries were frozen this summer and now I’m using them. I made blackberry jam like this 6 months ago and that jam is still delicious and tastes of blackberries fresh off the vine!
Raspberry Jam
Ingredients
- 5 quarts fresh or frozen raspberries
- 5 to 6 cups granulated sugar
Directions
- Place raspberries in a large bowl with 5 cups of granulated sugar and stir well.
- Cover bowl and allow the raspberries to macerate with the sugar and begin to release their juices.
- Stir the raspberries around every 30 minutes or so until the raspberries are soft / nonexistent and all the sugar is dissolved. You should have raspberry soup at this point!
- Check volume and add the remaining cup of sugar if needed. The raspberry to sugar ratio is 2:1. Given how little sugar is used, adding an extra cup of sugar will make cooking the jam easier.
- In a large shallow sauté pan (or electric skillet), bring the raspberries and sugar to a simmer. Simmer until the jam reaches desired gelling stage. Because I used a shallow electric skillet, it took me only about 15-20 minutes to reach the desired gelling stage.
- Once you have obtained desired gelling point, remove from heat. Skim foam off if necessary.
- Prepare water bath canner, jars, and lids. Don’t forgot to add 1/2 cup vinegar to canner water to keep your bottles looking nice.
- Ladle hot jam into hot jars leaving 1/4-inch headspace.
- Wipe rim and place hot lid on jar, screwing band down until fingertip-tight.
- Place jars in canner and return to a boil. Process for 5 minutes (0 – 1,000 feet elevation), 10 minutes (1,001 – 6,000 feet elevation), and 15 minutes (6,001 – 8,000 feet elevation).
- Turn off heat, remove canner lid and let jars sit in the hot water for another 10 minutes. This will prevent too much of the jam from pushing itself out the lids as it is cooling.
- Transfer jars to a towel-lined surface and let stand until completely cool, about 24 hours.
- Check lids and refrigerate any jars that are not sealed.
Notes
- 1 cup of fresh raspberries yields approximately 1/2 cup pureed, therefore 5 quarts (20 cups) of fresh raspberries is equal to 10 cups pureed. Given the 2:1 ratio, the recipe uses 5 cups of sugar for 10 cups pureed raspberries (20 cups fresh raspberries). If you used the 2:1 ratio with fresh raspberries, you’d actually be at a 1:1 ratio (10 cups sugar for 10 cups pureed raspberries). Blech, too sweet!
- Do not double this recipe. Making jams can be finicky and doubling the recipe could be disastrous!
- You can halve the recipe, that will make cooking time faster and easier.
- Use the widest and most shallow pan you have, the deeper the pan the longer you will have to cook your jam. You will lose the fresh berry flavor the longer the jam has to cook.
- Fresh berries would be better than frozen berries, but use what you have!
HandmadePhD 
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