Simple and sweet blueberry jam! The perfect summer project for the kids and so delicious!
Right about mid-summer the most beautiful blueberries you have ever seen start popping up everywhere around here.
Just a 10 minute drive down the road from our house is a wonderful family blueberry farm where we pick plump, sweet blueberries every year.
and have always had very good outcomes on my jams with it. You don’t need a load of sugar to make it work, and you should be able to find it in your health food store. If you can’t, Amazon does carry it.
Blueberry Jam
Simple and sweet blueberry jam! The perfect summer project for the kids and so delicious!
Ingredients
- 16 cups whole blueberries
- ½ cup juice from a lemon
- 1 TB calcium water comes in the Pomona pectin pack
- 1 TB pectin powder comes in the Pomona pectin pack
- 2 cups organic pure cane sugar If you want to use raw honey, back it off to about 1 ½ cups
Instructions
- Put the whole berries, lemon juice, and calcium water in a large stock pot and bring to a boil. Use a potato masher to squish up the berries as they warm and get soft.
- While the berries are warming, whisk the pectin with the sugar.
- Once the berries are mashed up to your liking, and has come to a boil, pour in the sugar/pectin mixture and stir constantly for a couple minutes so everything dissolves.
- Bring the jam up to a boil again, and then turn off the heat.
- Ladle the jam into your jars or containers, let them come to room temp, and then put them in the freezer WITHOUT the lids on. Let them freeze for a day before you lid them. You could alternatively follow hot water bath canning instructions instead of the freezing.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
Tips:
- Here is where you can get the Pomona’s 100% citrus pectin
if you can’t find it in your health food store – I have been using it for years and it always works very well – very forgiving. - This recipe makes about 2 dozen 4oz jars (about 12 cups) – just half the recipe if you don’t think you want that many. This jam will last me until next summer!
- You can alternatively blend your blueberries to a puree before you cook them if you like a super smooth jam. They really cook down well anyway, and it really has a pretty smooth texture even without blending. I just use a simple potato masher to squish up the berries while they cook!
- Have you seen these Ball Freezer Containers?! They are my absolute favorite. I do about half of my jam in the pretty little Ball glass jam jars so I can give them away for gifts, but the other half I put in the simple (cheap!) BPA free Ball freezer containers. You can put the lids right on and stick them in the freezer– they won’t crack like glass would with a lid on while they freeze! I usually give a few containers to my mom for the year so she can have them in her freezer when the girls spend the night at Gramma’s and might need a PB&J!
- The freezer jam will last a couple weeks in the fridge once thawed.
- We like to use our jam on pancakes! We don’t eat a ton of PB&J’s around here because we are gluten free and GF bread is expensive. But I do make large batches of pancakes to keep in the freezer, and the girls will have PB&J sandwiches using pancakes for the bread. You can also stir your jam into soaked oatmeal or whole plain yogurt!
to squish up the berries while they cook!
?! They are my absolute favorite. I do about half of my jam in the 
so I can give them away for gifts, but the other half I put in the simple (cheap!) BPA free Ball freezer containers. You can put the lids right on and stick them in the freezer– they won’t crack like glass would with a lid on while they freeze! I usually give a few containers to my mom for the year so she can have them in her freezer when the girls spend the night at Gramma’s and might need a PB&J!This post was shared at Fat Tuesday, and Real Food Wednesday!
40 lbs of blueberries?!!! That’s awesome.
Did you say you have a blueberry muffin recipe? I’d love the link. 🙂
Hi Holly! The blueberry muffin recipe will be live in the morning! I’m finishing it up tonight 😀
I LOVE the idea of freezer jam. I’ve always shied away from jams or other canning items, since I don’t know how to do that yet. This looks like I could actually do it myself. Thanks for the post.
And 40 pounds of blueberries? I’d be in Heaven…
Hi Amanda! I do zero canning 😀 I love my freezer and that is what I have time for right now!
Wow what a haul! How fabulous for you and your family! The jam looks divine!
Thank you Linda!
Yum! We are hoping to go blueberry picking this Friday.
Oh yum. Blueberry picking is the best. The pictures of your darling littles are just precious. The jam looks amazing!
Thank you <3
Thank you!
Yum! I love all things blueberry related!
I want to run right out and buy or pick blueberries! Awesome photos. Very inspiring.
Thank you Andrea!
I’m really jealous of that haul! My kids eat all of ours before we have time to preserve them.
That pic of the baby is too sweet!
Thank you Liz 😉 She had a ball!
Not only good but so pretty sitting on my counter. I love just looking at my own projects for a bit before I store them 😉
Thank you for this recipe…
Absolutely Carla! I do the same thing!
Made this this afternoon, it was not difficult at all to make and smelled so good! Can’t wait to try it! Thank you for the recipe!
I’m so glad you got a chance to try it Megan! Enjoy it!