We only had a small harvest of currants this year, so I didn’t bother with all the work of canning properly, I just made a quick refrigerator jam that we ate within a few weeks. First start, the currants:
This is about all we got from the red currant bush this year.
After all the sticks, stems and leaves are gone? Just a little more than this, really.
So to make any jam, even if you’re going to process it properly, you need to measure how much fruit you have, then decide how much sugar and lemon to add.
I really like the Amateur Gourmet’s take on this: See his post here on Jam making. Basically, through advice from David Lieboviz, says to add lemon zest and juice to the fruit, cook it down, then measure what you’ve got and multiply that by 3/4 to figure out how much sugar to add.
I do that, sort of, but instead I just put the fruit in the pot with some lemon juice and then add sugar to about 1/4 less the amount of fruit. Same exact ratio, different arithematic to get there.
Zest:
Juice:
Sugar:
Stirring:
Bring to a boil:
I just poured some boiling water into the jar and swished it around to sterlize it. Then I poured the currant preserves into the jar:
Our Currant Jam!
Quick Currant Preserves
Currants
Lemon zest
Lemon juice
Sugar
Wash and stem your currants. To figure out how much sugar to use, take 1/4 less the the amount of currants. (So if you’ve got 4 cups of currants, use 3 cups of sugar.)
Place the currants, sugar and a the zest and juice of one lemon in a heavy-bottom sauce pan. Stir until the sugar is dissolved.
Bring to a boil, then turn down to a simmer. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the currants look slightly wrinkled and if you drag a wooden spoon across the bottom of the pot, you can see the pot through the trail left behind.
Put the jam in a clean glass container. Allow to cool slightly, then refrigerate, covered, up to three weeks.
