Strawberry Jam

So a few days ago I said i'd post the recipe for strawberry jam that I used for the fruit we picked locally!

It's a really delicious jam and quite easy to make!

Recipe from BBC GOOD FOOD:

Ingredients:

1kg /2lb 3oz strawberries

1kg/2lb 3oz granulated sugar or caster sugar

½ lemon, juice only

Place the strawberries, sugar and lemon juice in a heavy bottomed pan. I used the Cruset which worked really well! Simmer gently until all the sugar has dissolved, and then bring the jam to the boil testing every ten minutes or so to see if its set. Heres a tip: Place a saucer in the freezer an hour before you make the jam. Then when you think the jam is set place a teaspoon of the jam onto the cold saucer. Push the jam on the saucer with your finger. If the jam wrinkles you know it has set and is ready to put into jars. If not keep boiling and checking every 8 minutes or so. 

Once your jam is set, ladle it into sterilised jars and it should keep for up to a year!

(It will be too yummy to want to keep it for a year though!!)

We had ours smothered on toast for breakfast this week!

 With a trusty mug of builders tea of course!

Pick your own

Scott and I went Strawberry picking last week and collected and array of delicious British fruits. We picked red currents, Strawberries and gooseberries. All were extra yummy and we cant wait for the cherries to be in season to go again shortly!

 Here are the red currents. We only picked a few of these as I like to use them mainly for decorating other desserts, though Scott does like to eat handfuls of them. His Nana also grows them in her garden so I think they always remind him of her which is sweet! I love the colour, so vibrant and fresh!

 We gathered a lot of smaller strawberries for both eating on there own and to make jam from!

 There is something extra special about picking your own fruit, I think it would be great to encourage children who are not really  a fan of fruit to actually eat more as there really is a big novelty of seeing them grow, picking them and eating them. I thinks it's standard to say you eat more fruit than you put i  your basket... which justifies the price of picking your own! We used to have a massive field full of pick your own strawberries but sadly it no longer exists and we have to travel slightly further afield. If your local the pick your own nearest us is near on the Aberwheiler/Bodfari road. You can't miss the signs (a giant strawberry) and its a really fun afternoon out.

I will post a little about the jam we made later :)