We LOVE harvesting our concord grapes every year from our backyard. When God gifts us an abundance, we pick them by the pounds and make good, juicy JAM! This year, after we picked, sorted and cleaned them, we had 35 POUNDS of organic, homegrown grapes.
Yum!
JAM TIME!!
We don't add any pectin to our jam at all. Just CANE SUGAR! Here are the steps we take to jar up this delicious, healthy treat.
Harvest the grapes. We don't spray our grapes. In fact, we rarely do anything about them. We have just 3 vines in the backyard, and we simply make sure they have plenty to climb on.
Sort the grapes. Again, we don't spray our grapes. So, that means we sometimes share them with the occasional spiders, bugs and debris. So after we pick, we all sit down as a family and hand sort them. Anything that looks like it has been gotten to, goes into the bad buckets. The good ones get rinsed.
Peel the grapes. SAVE THE PEELS!!! We squish the grapes by hand and you really want to make sure you save those purple peels, because you will NEED them later in the recipe!
Boil down the pulp, strain the seeds through a fine mesh. Discard the seeds or use them for something else. (Plant more grapes)
BLEND UP THE PEELS! Remember those peels you saved? Toss them into a blender.
Add the blended peels back into the grape pulp and bring to a high boil. THIS is what is going to give your jam that lush, beautiful PURPLE COLOR!!!
Slowly add Cane Sugar, to taste. Approximately 1/2 cup - 1 cup to each pound of grapes. We like to warm the sugar on a low heat in the oven WHILE the grape pulp is boiling down (step 4). Approximately 150 degrees, on a cookie sheet. Then when you add the sugar into the cooking jam, it doesn't offset the temperature too much.
Cook to 220 degrees! Yes, you will want a CANDY THERMOMETER for this. It should sheet and kind of slide slowly off a spoon. TEST the temperature by putting a plate in the freezer, then put a teaspoon of hopefully finished JAM on the cold plate, and put in the freezer for a couple of minutes. When you take it out, it should be the consistency you desire. Taste it, and see if you need to add more sugar. (You can always add more sugar, you can't take it away). If you need the jam to be thicker, cook longer. Remember it will thicken as it cools, so be careful not to OVERCOOK it.
Jar up the JAM! A canning funnel works AMAZING for this. Highly recommend. You can find one at any place that sells canning supplies. It makes pouring the jam into the jars a cinch.
Water bath can to seal the jars and ENJOY!!!
