Strawberry Jam

I am keeping with the theme of adding variety to my food stores and this weekend's project was strawberry jam.  I had to get my strawberries from the grocery store instead of the farmer's market, but they were looking pretty good in the organic section, so I bought three pounds of them for this project.

To begin I washed and hulled all of the berries and squashed them into my large stainless steel saucepan.  I added sugar to the squished strawberries and them proceeded to cook them down to a jam-like consistency.  This was another pectin free recipe which calls for less sugar.  Once the mix reached the gel stage it was ready to be ladled into jars and put through a hot water bath in my canner.  The tiny spoonfuls I tasted while it was cooking were divine.

My finished product came out to seven half pints of jam.  They are a deep ruby red color with lots of chunks of delicious strawberries suspended in the jam.  I can't wait to taste some on toast or mixed into yogurt.  I may have to make a second batch if this one starts to disappear too fast.