wartime recipes

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Gingerbread People – Recipe No. 197

It’s funny to think that the first documented instance of figure-shaped gingerbread biscuit was at the court of Elizabeth I of England. She had the gingerbread figures made and presented in the likeness of some of her important guests which brought the human shape of the gingerbread cookies into popularity. Read more here.

Christmas is never Christmas without gingerbread people or houses! I’ve come across several recipes for ‘Gingerbread Men’ from around the 1940s, some using Golden Syrup (UK), some using Molasses or Corn Syrup (North America). Some contain an egg, others don’t.

Below is my favourite recipe in which I make one adaption to improve the binding and holding together of the gingerbread. It tastes absolutely lovely, is firm enough to also make slabs for gingerbread houses, we may do that next year!

I’d like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and really hope and wish that 2022 will be a year that sees you in good health and experience much happiness.

C xxxx

Ingredients

  • 350g plain flour
  • 140g of butter or margarine
  • 100g dark brown sugar
  • 3tbsp golden syrup (or molasses)
  • 1tbsp ground flaxseed (mix with 2.5 tablespoons of hot water, it helps hold the mixture together when baking)
  • 1 tbsp ground ginger
  • 2tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • pinch of salt

Method

  • Mix the flaxseed with 2.5 tablespoons of hot water. Mix well and set aside to thicken.
  • Melt butter, sugar and golden syrup in a pan on a low heat stirring slowly until all runny and melted. Set this aside in a mixing bowl to cool down a bit.
  • Stir in the flaxseed mixture thoroughly.
  • Add in the sieved flour, bicarbonate of soda, pinch of salt and all the spices and mix until a smooth dough is formed.
  • Wrap or place in container and chill in fridge for 30 minutes.
  • Heat oven to 180C
  • Roll the dough out onto a lightly floured surface to about 0.5cm and start stamping out the gingerbread.
  • Place on parchment paper on a baking tray.
  • Cook for about 15 minutes (slightly more or less according to your oven)
  • Remove from oven when cooked. Leave on sheet to cool down for 15 minutes then transfer to a cooling rack. Once fully cold then you can keep in an airtight container for about a week or so.
  • Decorate with icing sugar when fully cold. If no icing sugar available dent the dough before cooking to form eyes, mouth and buttons! Or just decorate with anything you’ve got!

Makes about 12 large gingerbread people.

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Crunchies – Recipe No. 195

How simple and so very delicious is this authentic wartime recipe. They were so easy and quick to make and would cope with the addition of sultanas or aromatic spices such as cinnamon and nutmeg or black market chocolate chunks.

I haven’t baked biscuits or cakes for quite some time, simply because I have a rather uncontrollable sweet tooth but with porridge oats being one of the main ingredients, I convinced myself that these were “good for me”. Three biscuits later (had to taste test!) I can comfortably say these are wonderfully comforting and one or two won’t do you too much harm!

Crunchies

  • 5 oz plain white flour
  • 4 oz porridge oats (I used regular porridge)
  • 2 oz sugar
  • 1 tsp baking powder
  • 2 oz lard
  • 2 oz butter or margarine (I used 4 oz of Flora plant based butter instead of lard and butter)
  • 2 oz golden syrup
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract (I didn’t have any and it still tasted great)
  1. Cream the fats, sugar, syrup and vanilla essence together until well mixed.
  2. Add the dry ingredients and mix until a dough forms.
  3. You can then divide mixture into 12 balls and press them onto the lined baking tray until they form round discs about 1 cm thick or you can flour a board, roll out the dough and cut out the biscuits.
  4. Bake at 180 c for about 20 minutes or so until golden brown on the edges.
  5. Remove from oven. Leave to cool on tray for 10 minutes then transfer to wire rack and leave to fully cool.

Makes 12 large biscuits, or 18 smaller ones.

You can listen to this recipe on Spotify: https://anchor.fm/carolyn-ekins

https://anchor.fm/carolyn-ekins
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Potato Peel Pie – Recipe No. 194

Traditional Guernsey Potato Peel Pie

Last month I watched a wonderful film called “The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society” and absolutely loved it. I loved it even more when 20 minutes into the movie a strange wartime dish called ‘Potato Peel Pie’ made an appearance, a insipid looking creation facilitating the gag reflex of all uninitiated humans who tasted it. That was enough for me to want to re-create it. Surely it couldn’t have been THAT bad?

Traditional Guernsey Potato Peel Pie was made of 3 ingredients, potatoes, beetroot and milk. With little flour or butter available to the islanders during German occupation, the potato peelings were used to create an open pie crust of sorts instead, into which mashed potato and chopped beetroot was added and then baked in the oven. I absolutely love potatoes but even I could see that without a few extras here and there and even with copious amounts of salt and pepper, this dish was going to be bland without some artistic licence!

I simply added some chopped spring onion (although leeks would have been good to use too) and some margarine to facilitate a pleasing taste. The ‘Potato Peel Pie’ was very tasty, I didn’t skimp on the salt and pepper because without these it would have indeed been very bland.

Here is the recipe for the authentic WW2 “Guernsey Potato Peel Pie” with my additions noted.

WW2 Guernsey Potato Peel Pie

Ingredients:

  • 2 large potatoes
  • Dash of milk
  • Beetroot
  • Salt & pepper
  • (I also added spring onion and margarine)

Method:

  1. Wash your two large potatoes and peel the potatoes
  2. Par-boil the potato skins for 3-5 minutes
  3. Drain and set aside
  4. Grease a two person size pie dish
  5. Place the potato peels on the bottom and around the sides
  6. Dot in some margarine
  7. Press the peels down a little to the bottom and sides and sprinkle with salt
  8. Dice up some slices of beetroot (I used some pickled beetroot) and dot around the base
  9. Place pie dish in a pre-heated oven at 220C until the potato peels are properly cooked and the edges are browning
  10. Cut your remaining peeled potatoes into chunks and boil until cooked.
  11. Drain and set aside.
  12. Cut up onions or leeks and fry until cooked in a pan
  13. Add in the cooked potato chunks and mash adding in milk where needed and lots of salt and pepper
  14. Place the mash into the potato peel pie crust
  15. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and continue baking in the oven until the top is lightly crisped.
  16. Remove and let sit for 5 minutes before serving

Serves 2.

PS: Check out my Art Channel here: https://www.youtube.com/CarolynHylandAnimalNatureArt

https://www.youtube.com/CarolynHylandAnimalNatureArt
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Rhubarb & Apple Jam – Recipe No. 193

My friend Jacquie (who I hadn’t seen in person for over 30 years) recently dropped off a big bag of rhubarb at my door. It was absolutely lovely to see her again at a distance and to receive the gift of rhubarb. Infact, I’m doing quite well because Olly, her husband (who I also hadn’t seen for over 30 years) dropped off 3 raspberry canes for my garden last month too. Needless to say, when it is safe to visit in a month or two (or three) it will be great to catch up with them properly and bring reciprocal goodies in return!

The very next day I set to work on making a rhubarb and apple jam (with a cup full of frozen berries thrown in for good measure). Using a standard recipe from the Ministry of Foods ‘Jams and Jellies’ leaflet I substituted one of the main ingredients (in this case elderberries for rhubarb) and that was pretty much that.

Maincrop Rhubarb often has stringy bits in it, you’ll see what I mean when you cut the end. Simply lift the strings and pull down the stalk to remove them. I removed some of mine not all. Everything was fine..

As always, jam with rhubarb is delicious. To me, it is synonymous with an English wartime kitchen garden. As I enjoyed some fresh homemade bread slathered with the jam after taking the main photos today, it somehow fit perfectly into a warm sunny afternoon. Despite being in the town centre, my garden backs onto ‘Queens Park’ in Swindon (where I now live) and I am lucky to have robins, blue tits, wrens, magpies, squirrels, bees and butterflies visiting daily and several curiously watched and hovered as I sat back quietly enjoying the simplicity and taste of bread and jam.

Hope you really enjoy this recipe.

C xxx

 

Ingredients

  • 2 lbs rhubarb
  • 2 lbs Bramley apples (any type will do but cooking is best)
  • 1 cup of mixed wild berries (blackberry, elderberry, blackcurrants or frozen mixed berries, whatever your favourite is!)
  • 3 lbs of sugar

 

Method

  1. Wash and peel apples and cut into chunks.
  2. Wash and string (where necessary) the rhubarb and chop into chunks, cover in all the sugar, mix and set aside for 30 minutes to bring out the juice.
  3. Put the sugar-coated rhubarb, rhubarb juice and apple chunks in a preserving pan (or similar) and simmer gently (add a little water if necessary) stirring slowly until soft (about 5-10 mins).
  4. Add the berries, bring to the boil and simmer, stirring slowly until soft (about 5-10 mins). Add a little more water if necessary as you don’t want the fruit to burn.
  5. Continue to boil rapidly for a further 10 mins stirring regularly.
  6. Take off the heat and test a large drop of jam on a chilled saucer and if it crinkles after a couple of mins it’s ready (alternatively use a jam/candy thermometer until it reaches 105C)
  7. If not boil for another 2 mins and repeat the test until ready.
  8. Remove excess scum with a slotted spoon.
  9. Ladle hot jam into hot sterilised jars having first made sure glass rims of jars are spotless. Clean with white vinegar if not.
  10. Put on hot lids and twist until finger tight. Set aside to cool undisturbed or alternatively further process in a hot water bath to ensure a good vacuum and seal.
  11. Makes several x 300 ml jars.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A FREE 160 page book of wartime Ministry of Food leaflets.

I bought an electronic copy of ‘Eating for Victory’ from Amazon the other day for just 99p (even though I already have a treasured hard copy which I bought at Castle Museum in York). It’s been invaluable to have it with me to give me ideas when rummaging around in the kitchen wondering what to cook with leftovers or make things stretch further.

The book is essentially jammed full of ‘Ministry of Food’ recipe and instruction leaflets from WW2 in full colour, not only a fascinating piece of social history but so very useful too for now and in the future. I’ve included some snapshots so you can see more, I simply HIGHLY recommend it!

Since buying the book online (which I read via a free download Kindle app) I realised that actually I could have got this for free as Amazon are currently doing a 60 day FREE Kindle Unlimited promotion so yes, you get to read FREE books during lockdown and you can, of course, cancel at anytime. Needless to say I’ve signed up to that now having made a note to cancel before the end of June should my job situation not improve but for now, I’ll make the most of it!

Much love, stay safe, C xxxx

You can buy the 99p Kindle app version HERE ON AMAZON

OR You can sign-up for 60 days Kindle Unlimited and get it for FREE HERE

QUOTE:
“How would you survive on wartime rations? Eating for Victory (subtitled Healthy Home Front Cooking on War Rations) makes for absolutely fascinating reading — and may answer the question as to what the reader might have made of these more straitened times.

The book reproduces official Second World War instruction leaflets (which have never before been published in book form) and demonstrates how millions of people in Britain endured food shortages during the hardships of WWII. With a perceptive foreword by Jill Norman, Eating for Victory shows that the government endeavoured to keep morale high by producing a host of the upbeat leaflets included here on such subjects as ‘using up stale crusts’ and ‘foods for fitness’ (the leaflets are most amusing in this area, showing how much thinking has changed over the years — the use of fats and lard looks very quaint in these more enlightened times). But what gives particular pleasure here is the verbatim reproduction of the original artwork and typefaces, which vividly conjures a lost era. To read this entertaining little book is like climbing into a time machine to take us back to the 1940s.” –Barry Forshaw

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Mock Brains – Recipe No. 191

Mock recipes were created during the war because people missed the ‘real thing’ during times of rationing. Forgive me for saying this but SERIOUSLY, were brains so popular before the war that people really missed eating them? It would appear so…

Someone had posted this recipe on a 1940s food group on Facebook. Once I had recovered from the image of ‘Anthony Hopkins’ as Hannibal Lecture exhibiting a ‘Flehmen Response’ to the thought of human flesh and fava beans with a nice Chianti, despite being a vegetarian, I HAD to try this weirdness. Thankfully the massacre of oats was the only heinous crime I was about to commit…

Let me tell you, these mock brains were TASTY (but only with lots of seasoning and browning in fat). I was impressed as much as I was with the ‘MOCK BLACK PUDDING’ so don’t be afraid of trying these. They are so cheap to make which isn’t a bad thing right now with no work and no jobs!  I greedily ate these ALL for my lunch with a salad. I’d even go as far as to say if you added some garlic and extra spices like hickory smoke and paprika, you could cook them in fat in smaller nugget shapes and once they had cooled slightly, enjoy them with a nice tomato sauce or dip as a treat. I’d go for it and quite easily forget this was actually porridge!

 

Ingredients

  • 1 cup of leftover porridge
  • 1 tablespoon of self-raising flour
  • 1 small onion
  • 1 egg
  • large pinch of thyme
  • salt and pepper

 

Method

Chop the onion very fine, mix into the porridge, add the flour and flavouring, bind together with the beaten egg, form into rissoles, roll in flour then fry in hot fat until brown.

 

My tips: Don’t skimp on the frying fat, this will help give it some flavour. Add lots of salt and pepper and herbs and spices you like.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Blackcurrant & Bramley Apple Jam – Recipe No. 190

This jam was just lovely! I used the recipe from one of the Ministry of Foods ‘Jams and Jellies’ leaflets (see below) substituting elderberries for blackcurrants (as I had a couple of bags in my freezer). I have 3 jams on the go right now, plain blackcurrant, this blackcurrant and apple and a rhubarb, apple and berry (recipe coming soon). I’m particularly enjoying a teaspoonful in my morning porridge or a dollop on my fresh homemade bread 2 or 3 times a week.

I sterilise my jars for these jam recipes by washing the jars, rinsing in hot water and then placing the empty jars in a pre-heated oven at 150C for 20 minutes, removing them on the tray moments before ladling in the hot jam. The lids I rinse, place in a bowl, pour over very hot water from the kettle until the lids are submerged, and leave them there for several minutes before the jam is added to the jars.

Enjoy!

C xxxx

PS: There are useful jam making supplies on my Amazon shop HERE

 

Ingredients

  • 1.5 lbs Blackcurrants washed & drained (frozen berries are fine)
  • 1.5 lbs Bramley apples peeled, cored and cut into 1/2 inch sized chunks
  • 2.5 lbs Granulated sugar (maybe only 2lbs of sugar if using sweet apples)
  • 300 ml Water

Instructions

  1. Put the water and apple chunks in a preserving pan (or similar) and simmer gently, stirring slowly until soft (about 5-10 mins).
  2. Add the blackcurrants, bring to the boil and simmer, stirring slowly until soft (about 5-10 mins).
  3. Add the sugar and keep stirring to dissolve the crystals.
  4. Once dissolved boil rapidly for 10 mins stirring regularly.
  5. Take off the heat and test a large drop of jam on a chilled saucer and if it crinkles after a couple of mins it’s ready (alternatively use a jam/candy thermometer until it reaches 105C)
  6. If not boil for another 2 mins and repeat the test until ready.
  7. Remove excess scum with a slotted spoon.
  8. Ladle into sterilised jars. Makes several x 300 ml jars

Caveat: You can further process the jams after bottling (submerged in hot water and simmered for a further 15 minutes for a jars up to 500mls and 25 minutes up to 750 mls). This is often used to ensure a proper seal/vacuum once removed from the hot water. Although I usually further process with pickles etc I don’t always with high sugar jams as long as everything is clean and piping hot and the rims of the jar are absolutely clean when placing the lids on. Although botulism is quite rare these days you can’t be too clean and too careful so feel free to process further… xx

BOOK UPDATE: “The Pandemic Pantry cookbook is about half completed now. It is taking longer than I thought mostly because I’ve been using the nice weather to work in the garden to try and prepare for planting a victory garden. With no job and an uncertain future right now I HAD to put this first and make it a priority knowing that the nice weather wouldn’t be with us forever (we are forecast nearly two weeks of rain starting tomorrow). I feel that our food supply is important especially if prices rise over the coming months and hopefully, a garden of sorts will help my economic situation a little if times get tough…. hope you understand. I’ll be catching up with the book this week. Thanks for all the great recipes and messages. It’s been AMAZING!” C xxxx

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WW1 Ration Scones – Recipe No. 186

I can tell you now, follow this recipe EXACTLY, and you will want to do nothing but feed these scones to ALL your floods of visitors once the UK lockdown has been abolished!

I used the basic WW1 Ration Scone recipe from 1918,  adding wild garlic leaves and 1 oz of hard grated cheese to create a delightfully aromatic and delicious savoury scone.

Behind my old house up North, there was a small wooded area that grew an abundance of wild garlic which I regularly used in salads or wilted in stews. So you can imagine how delighted I was when my Riverford Organic Vegetable Box arrived this week with a bag of wild garlic leaves perched on the top, waiting for me to scream in delight! (I actually squeaked). I have yet to find a source of free wild garlic down South where I now live so this really was a treat to receive this.

I found the original WW1 Ration Scone recipe from 1918 in an article in ‘People’s Friend Magazine’ and I immediately thought I bet that would taste AMAZING with a little chopped wild garlic leaf and some of the hard vegetarian cheese (Parmesan type) I had waiting to be used up. Seemed silly not to try.

I adapted the recipe slightly as I fancied savoury not sweet, you MUST give my version a try!

Hope you enjoy, and your floods of visitors too!

Stay calm, stay safe, stay home

C xxxx

PS: On your daily walk you may be able to source wild garlic for free. It’s typically found in woodland, quite near the edges and abundant in April/May. Watch this video HERE

Wild Garlic & Cheese Scones (based on WW1 Ration Scones from 1918 above)

  • 5 oz of white self-raising flour
  • 2 oz of butter or hard margarine
  • 1 egg and a little milk
  • 1 oz grated hard cheese (cheddar would be fine if you have no Parmesan)
  • Several wild garlic leaves chopped very finely
  • Large pinch of salt.

Method

  1. Sift flour and large pinch of salt into a bowl
  2. Dot in the butter and then rub into the flour
  3. Add the grated cheese
  4. Add the chopped wild garlic leaves
  5. Add the eggs and milk mixture leaving a spoonful to brush tops of scones before baking
  6. Form a dough that is not too sticky and can be handled.
  7. On a floured surface roll out to about 1/2 inch thick and use cutter or end of glass to create 6 scones (you may get more if you are lucky)
  8. Place on baking tray, brush with egg mixture and sprinkle a little more salt on the top of each scone
  9. Place in pre-heated (200 C) oven for about 20 minutes until a nice mid golden colour.
  10. Remove and place on wire rack.
  11. Enjoy while still slightly warm with butter. Would also be lovely served in a bowl with stew!

Makes 6 or 7

 


 

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10 Wartime Stale Bread Recipes to Save Food from the Bin and Feed Your Family!

Don’t you dare throw that stale bread ( or breadcrumbs ) away and join the CoronaVirus panic buying throngs who are now discarding all their rotting ‘fresh’ produce. Bread is one of the foods I’m seeing a lot of photos of in dustbins. SAVE IT NOW from the mouth of the hungry metal monster due to take it away on ‘bin-day’ by cooking some of these delicious wartime recipes (mostly puddings). They’ll keep in the fridge for days once baked, and in the freezer for months!

I’d like to apologise in advance for the ‘amazing photography’ from 10 years ago (British sarcasm) in several of the recipes below, it was in the early days of the blog which started in 2009, when I was flat broke and REALLY struggling. I think most of my photos were taken on an old flip video camera but I like to keep them to remember my journey and it’s various challenges.

Stay calm, stay safe, stay home,

C xxxx

Padded Pudding with Mock Cream: Watch the video above. The stale bread mixed with milk and cooked with jam looks like poo. I felt like Letita Cropley carrying out one of her great culinary experiments with strange ingredients. It actually tasted great! A good life lesson, don’t judge something or someone on how it/they look, chances are they will taste surprisingly delicious… just sayin’! Click here for recipe.

Plum Charlotte: Here’s a super-frugal wartime recipe made out of stale bread and fruit that’s going a little soft. As I had two of these things in my kitchen and I’m always finding ways to make ends meet, when I saw this recipe I knew it was just what I needed.
Click here for recipe.

Bread and Butter Pudding: In Marguerite Patten’s “Victory Cookbook” there is always one pudding recipe that is an absolute ‘go-to’ when one needs comforting and one has spare eggs. All becomes good in the world when you take that first spoonful of sugary topped, eggy, bready, sultana sprinkled, nutmeggy deliciousness, especially if served with a little hot custard if you can overlook the fact that it looks like cockroaches are climbing all over my food in the photograph… Click here for recipe.

Duke Pudding: How can stale bread and grated old carrots possibly be decadent? Trust me they are when you make them into a wartime “Duke Pudding”… Seeing the rapidly drying bread on my countertop and the carrots beginning to get spotty in the fridge, it was time once again to turn nothing into something in true 1940s home-front style and create a truly delicious alternative comfort food, much needed today of all days. Excuse the photography, it was 8 years ago and I hadn’t a clue! Click here for recipe.

Danish Apple pudding: Possibly one of the WORST food photos I have taken in my life from 10 years ago. It’s blurred and I’m not sure what I took the photo with. It could have something other than a camera because I probably didn’t have one.. Don’t let the brown blurry blob put you off. I remember this pudding was fab! I need to re-create and re-photograph! Click here for recipe.

Bread and Apple Pudding:For pudding the request was for ‘bread pudding’ yet again. To avoid this wartime pudding permanently being referred to as “bread-pudding-yet-again” I turned to a large bowl of sorry looking apples for divine inspiration- after-all Sir Isaac Newton stared at apples for an awfully long time before being rewarded with an answer… Click here for recipe.

Bread and Prune Pudding: You know that can of stewed prunes that has been languishing in your larder for several years, that you don’t want to throw away because you have inherited your grandmother’s and possibly mother’s innate ability to have everything stored away for a ‘rainy day’, WELL, you are about to use it and it’s gonna taste pretty damn good! Click here for recipe.

Brown Betty: It was unusual to make bread pudding without raisins in, Brown Betty has none, no eggs or milk either which makes me think all bread puddings could indeed be made eggless. Instead, it has water, the juice, and zest of a lemon and a generous quantity of golden syrup, spices, two grated apples, a little sugar and of course LOTS of stale bread! Click here for recipe.

Bread Pudding: I re-created this recipe about 12 years ago. This wartime recipe is easy-peasy and tasty. And of course it all in the custard too. Click here for recipe.

Bread Stuffing: And finally a recipe made from stale bread that isn’t a pudding and doesn’t look like a formless brown blob. Bread stuffing is so easy to make! This photo is from about 12 years ago, my pre-vegetarian days! Click here for recipe.

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Blackcurrant Jam – Recipe No. 184

This is such a simple wartime recipe for a small quantity of delicious, velvety, deep-purple, mouthwatering blackcurrant jam. You HAVE to try it and so crazy-easy to attempt for your first go at making jam!

Fresh blackcurrants are preferable but to make it even easier I made this small-batch from frozen fruit perfectly! (In fact DON’T WAIT for fresh berries to come into the shops. It might be wise to buy some bags of frozen berries. Our British fruit pickers (over 90%) come from Eastern Europe each year performing vital services to our fruit harvesting industry. With our current ‘Coronavirus Pandemic’ situation, our normal guaranteed and reliable agricultural workers from overseas may be restricted from their normal annual travel to the UK which could be devastating for UK farmers if they cannot recruit enough British workers.)

Next time I go shopping (trying to restrict it to a maximum of once or twice a week for fresh produce), I’ll certainly be buying myself a bag or two of more frozen berries while they are available.

I enjoyed two slices of bread I made yesterday slathered in this ‘juicy assed jam’ with a nice cuppa tea and I recommend you do exactly the same.

It will make you smile.

Take care, stay safe, stay home

C xxxx

Blackcurrant Jam (makes 3 x 1 lb pots)

Ingredients

  • 4 cups of frozen berries
  • 3 cups of sugar
  • 1/2 lemon squeezed (not vital)
  • 1 teaspoon of pectin (not vital but I always add to all jams I make)
  • Clean jam jars (rinse, heat in oven at 140C for 15 minutes)
  • Clean lids (rinse, place in a small bowl, cover with hot pre-boiled water until ready to seal jars)

Method

  1. Put the 4 cups of frozen berries in a large thick-bottomed saucepan and put onto a medium heat.
  2. Stir until berries are defrosted and simmering gently (about 5 mins). Remove from heat.
  3. Mash with a potato masher a little so some of the berries burst to the consistency you like.
  4. Mix the sugar and pectin and add to the berry mix and stir until all mixed together.
  5. Add in the 1/2 squeezed lemon.
  6. Return to medium heat and keep stirring slowly adjusting the heat so as not to burn.
  7. You need to bring the mixture to a rolling boil, stirring all the time and maintain this for about 10 minutes until the setting point has been reached (105 C or 220 F). If you don’t have a thermometer drop 1/2 teaspoon onto a cold plate and if after a minute it thickens and becomes fairly firm instead of liquid then it has reached the setting point.
  8. Once the correct temperature has been reached, keep stirring and give the mixture another minute.
  9. Remove from heat and stir again.
  10. Remove hot jars from oven (see above)
  11. Using a ladle and funnel, add the hot jam mixture to the hot jars and twist on the clean hot lids.
  12. Set aside, the jar will be hot and will take at least a few hours to cool.
  13. Jam is ready to use once it has totally cooled down and unopened will keep for a year or two.


People have asked me where I have been getting my cute jars and labels. The links are below:

JARS: 24 jam/chutney jars with gingham printed lids

>>CLICK HERE<<

LABELS: Re-usable and removable labels for jars and containers with chalk pen.

>>CLICK HERE<<

CANNING FUNNELS: 2 sizes, stainless steel for all jam/chutney/relish making.

>>CLICK HERE<<