I’ve been fortunate in that I’ve never had to learn how to make strawberry freezer jam. I’ve been even more fortunate in that I never even tasted store-bought jam until I was practically an adult.

As a result, I’m spoiled. Spoiled rotten. I turn up my nose at Smucker’s, and even those fancy top-shelf brand jams can’t satisfy.

I never had to learn how to make strawberry freezer jam because every year I saw my mom make it right in front of me. Sis and I got drafted to help pick strawberries in our grandparents’ strawberry patch. I recall crouching low, pushing through the leaves, and searching for the elusive strawberries Grandma insisted were still there even though we were sure we’d gotten them all.

Nowadays we buy our strawberries already picked from local growers. Rhode’s Strawberries, run by “Captain Bob” Rhode of Chesaning Showboat fame, is always our first choice. Most area growers this year, though, complained of small harvests and we wound up going about 35 miles away to find reasonably-priced berries.

let’s make strawberry freezer jam!

Making strawberry freezer jam is a snap because there’s no special recipe. In fact, deviation from the standard recipe is frowned upon because it will likely result in failure of the jam to set up properly. Just clean one quart of strawberries per batch of freezer jam. Have one package of Sure-Jell or other pectin on hand for each batch. Then chop up those berries. You could briefly, carefully whirl them in a food processor, or use a potato masher, but I find the chopper to be my favorite.

Oops, you can’t really see the chopper in that pic. Here’s a better one! See, it’s like a biscuit cutter, but darksided.

Add the sugar to the chopped strawberries. I’ve got a double batch going in this picture; that’s why there’s so honkin’ much. You can totally double batch it, but don’t even think of triple or more batches at a time. That’s crazy talk.

At this point in the process, if you’re gonna be snapping pictures, you’d better have someone else around, because the stirring and the pouring and the stirring again and the zomg fill the jars before jam sets madness is going on and things are, if not exactly hectic, then not quite “Let’s stop and compose an artsy photo” conducive.

See, for the above, after the lime went in the coconut sugar went in the strawberries, the water went into the pectin, the pectin-water went into the strawberry-sugar, and the pectin-water-strawberry-sugar went into the adorable little jars. And all pretty quickly too, because if you lollygag, the jam will set up before you get it into the jars, which isn’t a tragedy but is a bit messy.

The strawberry freezer jam recipe is in every package of Sure-Jell, and I’m including it below as well, with tips and commentary Kraft simply does not offer. Oo la la.

strawberry freezer jam recipe

Every time I’ve made strawberry freezer jam, and every time anyone I know has made it, I’ve gotten more jam than the recipe predicts (5). I always wind up with 6 cups or 6½ cups. So be prepared with extra clean jars/containers. In fact, that’s always a good idea when canning or preserving. You don’t want to stop in the middle of something time-sensitive to wash jars.

yield: 5–6 cups
special equipment: chopper or food processor; funnel
time: 60 to 90 minutes, plus 24 hours

1 quart strawberries
4 cups granulated sugar
¾ cup water
1 box Sure-Jell fruit pectin

Wash 6 cups’ worth of containers and lids in warm soapy water and dry thoroughly.

Hull and wash strawberries. Chop strawberries until they’re soupy and contain chunks in the size you desire.

Stir in the sugar. It won’t all dissolve right away. Let stand for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. While waiting, set out jars/containers where you plan to fill them, and get a ladle and a funnel ready if you have one.

In a small saucepan, mix water and pectin and bring to a boil over high heat. Stir constantly. Boil for 1 minute, stirring constantly and watching to be sure it does not boil over.

Remove pectin from heat and add to the strawberry-sugar mixture. Stir for 3 minutes or until sugar is dissolved. The sugar may not be entirely dissolved, but 3 minutes is all you need to stir, or less if the sugar dissolves quickly.

Immediately fill containers, ladling the hot jam through the funnel if you have one, leaving ½ inch head space to allow room for expansion in the freezer.

Cover containers with their lids and let stand at room temperature for 24 hours. Then the strawberry freezer jam is all ready to go into the freezer.

© Amy for Shiny Cooking, 2010. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: strawberries

Update: strawberry and feta salad is now entered in this week’s ZOE Secret Ingredient Challenge. Psst: the secret ingredient is feta.

With strawberry vinaigrette!

You know. I’ve really got to begin paying attention to presentation when I snap these photos. I’ve been just putting something on a plate or bowl the way I’d eat it and sometimes it’s not quite so…attractive.

Like this strawberry and feta salad. I shouldn’t have mixed it up first. I should have put the lettuce in the bowl, artfully arranged the strawberry slices on top, rakishly sprinkled the toasted slivered almonds atop that, and strategically placed feta crumbles throughout. Then I should have drizzled the strawberry vinaigrette on the lettuce only, magically avoiding the strawberries, almonds, and feta.

But noooooo.

It’s all mixed together, feta tinted pink by rogue strawberry juices, lettuce with messy-looking bits of cheese and strawberry clinging to it, almonds haphazardly fallen to the bottom of the bowl.

It’s a pictorial Hindenberg.

/end rant

This is the last of the strawberries. Everybody heave a big sad sigh here. Don’t tell sis; these are the ones I got from her last week. They’ve been languishing in the fridge covered in plastic wrap, crying out in their tiny high little voices. Needless to say, some of them had to go. But they were in decent shape; a few soft spots here and there; a few too soft to use.

The lettuce in the garden is still going strong, which is really weird for July. It made it through last week’s hot spell without bolting, and these cooler days are making it happy face.

If you have rabbit food and some strawberries in the fridge, try out this salad. The tang of the feta is a neat counterpoint to the strawberries, and who can resist crunchy almonds?

Try the strawberry vinaigrette on a spinach salad, too. What do you like to do with fruity vinaigrettes?

strawberry and feta salad

prep: 20 minutes
into your mouths: 20 minutes
servings: 5

strawberry and feta salad

8 ounces lettuce, torn
1-1/2 cups sliced strawberries
1/2 cup feta cheese, crumbled
1/2 cup slivered almonds, toasted

strawberry vinaigrette

1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 cup strawberries, halved
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon fresh basil, chopped
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper

Toast the almonds: Place in a shallow pan over medium heat. Shake or stir frequently. You want the almonds lightly browned, not dark brown. They’re almost done when you hear popping noises and smell the almonds.

Prepare the vinaigrette: Place olive oil, the 1/2 cup halved strawberries, balsamic vinegar, brown sugar, basil, salt, and pepper in a blender. Blend until smooth.

Mix the salad: In a large bowl, toss together the lettuce, 1-1/2 cups sliced strawberries, feta cheese, and toasted almonds. If serving immediately to a group, mix in strawberry vinaigrette. For single servings, add vinaigrette to taste.

© Amy for Shiny Cooking, 2009. | Permalink | 8 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: almonds, feta, lettuce, strawberries

Otherwise known as: kind of mashed, kind of sweet strawberry yumminess.

This how-to might seem pretty basic, and it is. It’s not hard, but there are a few things that are still nice to know. For instance, you might as well hull the berries before washing them. Inevitably you run into a mushy spot here or there, plus then you don’t have to worry about getting all the sand that may be lurking under the green leaves on the blossom end — without the hulls it will rinse right off.

I do not recommend using a blender or food processor for macerating strawberries. No matter how careful you are, the berries will get chopped too finely, ending up close to a strawberry purée. With shortcake, you aren’t pouring on a purée, you’re ladling on sweet bits of strawberry in their own juice.

Ingredients:

1 quart strawberries
up to 1/3 cup sugar

Equipment:

paring knife
colander
9 x 13 pan
potato masher

1. Hull the strawberries by slicing off the very blossom end with the paring knife. The easiest way to do this is to hold the berry between finger and thumb in your off hand, and slicing in a shallow “V” motion across the top. The goal is to remove the leaves and tough end without taking off too much sweet strawberry in the process. Toss the hulled strawberries in the colander as you go.

Grandma would have said that was still too wasteful, and preferred to hull with her fingernail. That’s a pain in the butt, and I’ve discovered I can deal with 0.005 ounces of good berry getting cut off with the bad.

2. Take the colander to the sink and rinse the berries in cold water, making sure all dirt and sand is washed away. If you’re working with a lot of strawberries, just fill up a clean sink with cold water and toss them in there, and rinse under the tap as you take them out.

Transfer the cleaned whole strawberries to the 9 x 13 pan.

3. Now it’s time for potato masher fun! Grab your masher and mash ‘em up good. The strawberries will release juice as you macerate them. Crush them as much as you want. Note you can use this same technique when preparing strawberries for jam. For shortcake, leave some nice big chunks in. For jam, mash more finely.

Wasn’t it a great idea to mash the strawberries in the pan? There’s no mess anywhere, and it’s all contained.

4. Transfer the mashed strawberries to a bowl. Add sugar to taste. Go light; the mixture will taste sweeter as the sugar fully dissolves. You may want to go naked, or add just a tablespoon or two. Start slowly and add more if it’s too tart. You can always add more sugar, but it’s impossible to take sugar out.

Of course, there is ONE cure for too-sweet strawberries is…add more strawberries!

© Amy for Shiny Cooking, 2009. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: strawberries

Strawberry season is full-bore, yay! We don’t grow them in our garden, though my grandma used to. Sis has a patch in her garden, though. The only thing fun about picking strawberries is popping them in your mouth while you do it. Otherwise it’s hunched-over, hunt-and-peck labor.

So we order them from a local grower. How do we know when they’re ready? When the ad appears in the local weekly announcing they are taking orders. Then I wind up with 4, 8, 16 quarts or more and knowing what I’ll be doing with some but not all.

And the first thing that gets done with them is to make strawberry shortcake. The recipe is from my dad’s mom, though I can’t guarantee old-world charm: It wasn’t until I was grown up that I discovered their special chocolate chip cookie recipe was the same as the one on the Toll House chocolate chip bag.

It’s a biscuit-like cake, not a sweet, spongy one. Those discs you see in the grocery store? Pure heresy. If you’ve never had a biscuit-like shortcake, you have to try this one. The combination of the barely-sweet buttermilk-scented crumbly cake with sweetened strawberries and whipped cream is to die for.

Note: Dad likes to butter his shortcake before ladling on the strawberries, but I don’t do that often. It impedes the berry juice from seeping into the shortcake. Oh, we WANT the berry juice seeping into the shortcake.

Watch out for the cereal effect. You know, how the milk and the box of cereal never run out at the same time. You’ll find yourself running out of shortcake with berries left, so you have to make more shortcake. Or you’ll run out of berries with shortcake left, so you have to mix up some more sweetened strawberries. Beware!

strawberry buttermilk shortcake

The original recipe uses all-purpose flour. I’ve found it works just as well with white whole wheat flour. While the shortcake is baking, you can prepare the strawberries.

prep: 15 minutes
to table: 35 minutes
servings: 9-12
oven: 425 degrees for 20 minutes

buttermilk shortcake:

2 cups white whole wheat flour or whole wheat pastry flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup buttermilk
1/3 cup canola oil
1 egg

Oil an 8-inch or 9-inch square pan.

In a large bowl, mix together the dry ingredients; flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and salt. In a medium bowl, beat together the wet ingredients: buttermilk, oil, and egg. Add wet ingredients to dry, and mix together.

Pour batter into the oiled 8- or 9-inch pan. Bake at 425 degrees for 20 minutes.

strawberry topping:

1 quart strawberries, washed and hulled
granulated white sugar to taste (start with a few tablespoons; you may find yourself using up to 1/3 cup of sugar)

Coarsely mash berries, releasing juice yet keeping good-sized chunks of strawberry. Add sugar to taste.

To serve: cut a square-shaped piece of shortcake from the pan and split like a biscuit. Butter if desired. Spoon on heaps of sweetened strawberry mixture. Top with whipped cream if desired, or vanilla ice cream to be really decadent. Good warm or cold.

© Amy for Shiny Cooking, 2009. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: strawberries, whole wheat flour