Honey preserves

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Got buckets full of blackcurrants awaiting treatment and thought I'd try making blackcurrant and honey jam/preserve anyone got a recipe or know where I could find one?

 

[Tom Bick]

No but have thought about blackberry and honey this year.

I have in the past made marmalade with honey using the tins of prepared oranges. The recipe on the tin asks for a quantity of sugar and water and the trick is don’t add the water and add 25% more by weight of honey substituting the sugar, so if it asks for 1lb of sugar you add 1.25lb of honey. This is delicious marmalade.

So with regular jam its equal quantities of fruit to sugar no water, or at least the way I do it, so is it a straight swap honey for sugar or 50/50, or?? experimentation may be the way to go. Not long before blackberry picking season and unripe honey will coincide.

 

[pargyle]

Got buckets full of blackcurrants awaiting treatment and thought I'd try making blackcurrant and honey jam/preserve anyone got a recipe or know where I could find one?

Jam is normally 1Kg fruit to 1 Kg sugar ... you'll need some pectin with blackcurrants, as they don't have a lot, so you can add either the juice of a couple of lemons or limes, and an apple (including the skin and core) to the mix - or a sachet of powdered pectin.

I'd go seedless with blackcurrants so stew all the fruit up together, mush it with a potato masher and put it through a seive (you'll have one of those). Wash the resultant seived solids with a small amount of water to get all the natural sugar and flavours out and seive it again.

Weigh the resultant strained liquid and add 1 Kg of sugar per Kg of liquid (less if you like a less sweet jam).

Substitute honey for some of the sugar ... or all of the sugar if you have enough honey to warrant it.

Then, bring it all gently to the boil in a big pan (double the size of your ingredients as it will rise up the pan). Rolling boil for as long as it takes to get to the setting point. (Saucer in the freezer, drop a spoonful of the boiled jam on to the cold saucer, if it wrinkles when you drag your finger through it then it's ready to jar up). If it doesn't - boil a bit longer.

If you like the taste of honey in your jam then, when you have reached the setting point, take the jam off the boil and stir in some honey before putting it in the jars.

Dead easy.

 

[Anduril]

There are a few on the web, American by the looks of it, after typing in blackcurrant and honey jam. An interesting one is caramelized onion and blackcurrant jam.

 

[MuswellMetro]

No but have thought about blackberry and honey this year.

I have in the past made marmalade with honey using the tins of prepared oranges. The recipe on the tin asks for a quantity of sugar and water and the trick is don’t add the water and add 25% more by weight of honey substituting the sugar, so if it asks for 1lb of sugar you add 1.25lb of honey. This is delicious marmalade.

So with regular jam its equal quantities of fruit to sugar no water, or at least the way I do it, so is it a straight swap honey for sugar or 50/50, or?? experimentation may be the way to go. Not long before blackberry picking season and unripe honey will coincide.

i hadthoughts on using unripe honeyas well and I was assuming it to be about 25% water, so for 10lb of fruit then i was going to add honey at 10/0.75 = 13.33lbs of unripe honey, , so prorata for every 1lb of sugar i will add 1.333lbs of unripe honey

I assume the excess water will just take longer to boil off to jam Set point

 

[pargyle]

I assume the excess water will just take longer to boil off to jam Set point

Yep ... that's exactly what happens .. that's why I wash the seivings as any excess water just boils off but you keep the sugar and flavour. The unripe honey will be the same ...

 

[Tom Bick]

You must try that marmalade Geoff John Chapple put me on to it delicious.

Looks like I may be experimenting big time as I have plenty of part capped supers to clear in a week or so. Going to get one of the gismos to double check but me thinks I will be mead and jam making and more mead this year

 

[Queens59]

You must try that marmalade Geoff John Chapple put me on to it delicious.

More info? Please sir??

 

[Tom Bick]

You must try that marmalade Geoff John Chapple put me on to it delicious.

More info? Please sir??

Post 2 paragraph 2

 

[VEG]

Ohh nooo is that 1:1 or 2:1 lol

 

[Queens59]

Oooo.....sorry - blushes and hides...

 

[BeeJayBee]

If you like the taste of honey in your jam then, when you have reached the setting point, take the jam off the boil and stir in some honey before putting it in the jars.

That's sounds the easiest thing to do, and will use less honey.

I'm still trying to imagine what blackcurrant honey jam will taste like, it sounds rather good.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

In the end I opted for 1.25 pounds of honey to a pound of blackcurrants and didn't bother with the lemon juice or anything (Currants are high enough in pectin IMHO) passed the wrinkle test (and the taste test ) and I've jarred it and just to be totally adventurous I'm going to put it in the Gower honey show this weekend

 

[pargyle]

In the end I opted for 1.25 pounds of honey to a pound of blackcurrants and didn't bother with the lemon juice or anything (Currants are high enough in pectin IMHO) passed the wrinkle test (and the taste test ) and I've jarred it and just to be totally adventurous I'm going to put it in the Gower honey show this weekend

Excellent ... my blackcurrant jam a couple of years ago (from a job lot late market sell offs) didn't set despite boiling and boiling and boiling .. I put it down to a lack of pectin but sounds like you succeeded. Should be an interesting combination ..

Good luck with the show !

 

[VEG]

In the end I opted for 1.25 pounds of honey to a pound of blackcurrants and didn't bother with the lemon juice or anything (Currants are high enough in pectin IMHO) passed the wrinkle test (and the taste test ) and I've jarred it and just to be totally adventurous I'm going to put it in the Gower honey show this weekend

Put me down for a jar for when we next meet

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

It's in reserve ready for you - haven't made much as SWMBO has decided I make a mess in the Kitchen when I do anything so i did a small sneaky batch this afternoon - the only thing I usually do in there is clean up after her cake fests! (spates of showers and work related things now stopping me from picking any more!) looks a lot tidier now than this morning!

 

[BeeJayBee]

In the end I opted for 1.25 pounds of honey to a pound of blackcurrants and didn't bother with the lemon juice or anything ... passed the ... taste test )

Brilliant!

I was a bit worried about the honey tasting like caramel with all the cooking, but obviously not. Any idea what sort of honey you used?

Good luck at the show.

 

[jenkinsbrynmair]

Just the usual local stuff balsam, blackberry and the like

 

[BeeJayBee]

OK. Thanks