Blackberry and Apple Jam

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Wide heavy-bottomed preserving pan or stockpot
• •Wooden spoon
• •Ladle and a wide-mouthed funnel if you have one
• •Four medium jam jars with lids
• •Small saucer for the wrinkle test

Instructions

1. 1

   Sterilise the jars

   Wash four medium jars and their lids in hot soapy water, rinse well, and put them on a tray in a low oven, 120C, for fifteen minutes to dry out and sterilise. Leave them there until you need them. Cold jam in cold jars cracks the glass; warm jam in warm jars behaves itself.

   Pop a small saucer in the freezer at the same time. You'll need it later to test the set.
2. 2

   Soften the apples

   Put the chopped apples into a wide, heavy-bottomed pan with about 100ml of water and the lemon juice. Set them over a gentle heat and let them cook down for ten minutes or so, stirring now and then, until the apple has collapsed into a soft, slightly fluffy mush. This is where the pectin comes from. Don't skip it. Don't rush it.

3. 3

   Add the blackberries

   Tip the blackberries in on top of the softened apples. Stir them through and let them cook for five minutes, just until they start to give up their juice and the whole pan turns a deep, inky purple. The kitchen will smell of hedgerows and rain. That's the smell you're after.

4. 4

   Add the sugar

   Pour in all the sugar at once and stir gently over a low heat until every grain has dissolved. Run a wooden spoon along the bottom of the pan and feel for grittiness. If you can still feel sugar, keep stirring. Boiling jam with undissolved sugar gives you a grainy, joyless set, and there is no fixing it later.

   Trust your nose and your spoon, not the clock. The sugar tells you when it's ready by going completely silent under the wood.
5. 5

   Boil hard

   Once the sugar has dissolved, turn the heat up and bring the jam to a proper rolling boil. Not a polite simmer, a proper boil that you can't stir down. Let it bubble fiercely for eight to ten minutes. The colour will deepen, the bubbles will get smaller and glossier, and the surface will start to look like something between liquid and jelly. Skim off any pinkish foam that gathers at the edges.

6. 6

   Test for set

   Take the pan off the heat and spoon a little jam onto your cold saucer from the freezer. Wait a minute, then push it gently with your fingertip. If the surface wrinkles and the jam holds its shape, it's ready. If it slides about like syrup, put the pan back on the heat for another two or three minutes and try again. Most jams set somewhere between minute eight and minute fifteen. Yours will tell you when it's there.

   If you're nervous, a sugar thermometer reads 105C at the setting point. But the wrinkle test has worked for everyone's grandmother since long before thermometers, and it still works now.
7. 7

   Settle and jar

   Stir in the small knob of butter if you're using it. It melts the foam away in seconds. Let the jam stand for five minutes off the heat so the fruit settles evenly through it rather than floating to the top. Then ladle it carefully into the warm jars, right up to the brim, and seal straight away while everything is still hot. Label them when they've cooled. Write the date. You'll be glad in February.

Chef Tips

• •Pick the blackberries from somewhere away from busy roads, and give them a brief rinse in cold water before you use them. Don't let them sit in water or they'll go soft and lose their perfume. A quick swill, then drain them in a colander.
• •Bramleys are the right apple here because they collapse properly when cooked. Eating apples hold their shape and won't give you the same pectin lift. If all you have is eaters, add the juice of a second lemon to compensate.
• •Don't be tempted to reduce the sugar. Jam needs sugar to set, to keep, and to taste like jam rather than stewed fruit. If you want something less sweet, make a compote instead and eat it within the week.
• •Open jars keep in the fridge for about a month. Unopened, in a cool dark cupboard, the jam is good for a year. I usually find mine doesn't last that long. Someone always wants a jar.

Advance Preparation

• •The jam keeps unopened in a cool, dark cupboard for up to a year. Once opened, store in the fridge and use within a month.
• •If you can't get to the jam-making the day you pick the blackberries, freeze them on a tray and tip them into a bag once solid. Frozen blackberries make perfectly good jam, no need to defrost first.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 20g)