Grammy Hill's Strawberry Jam

Who knew that making your own strawberry jam could be so simple? I'm all about homemade. I always use homemade pie crust, despite the extra work because the taste is seriously so much better. I also love learning to become self-sufficient and self-sustaining. There is something so satisfying in knowing how to do something on your own. Now that I know how easy it is to make jam, I will very likely never buy Smucker's again!

Dalin's wonderful Grammy Hill always makes her own jam, and last weekend in Boise she taught my sister-in-law Shaina and I how it's done.

Ingredients:*
3 1/4 cups strawberries
1/4 cup lemon juice
1 box MCP pectin
1 cup corn syrup
4 1/2 cups sugar

*Note: We used two different recipes--one was found on the box of pectin, the other on the box of MCP pectin. Truthfully, I don't have a preference between the two recipes though the pectin one literally only contained strawberries, sugar, and pectin, so if you don't have corn syrup or lemon juice, that one will work just fine.

Instructions: 
We bought two flats of strawberries. (Basically, that is the equivalent of four large containers--and we didn't even use them all!)

Here is a picture of one flat.

Wash the strawberries with cool water, placing them in a strainer after their top are chopped off. 

Use a chopper preferably to chop the strawberries to the desired consistency. I like my jam to have little strawberry chunks in it so I made sure I did not over blend. 

Picture of box of MCP Pectin. I had no idea what this was until we tried this recipe.

Measure 3 1/4 cup crushed and chopped strawberries into large bowl. Stir in lemon juice. Stir in MCP pectin and let stand for 30 minutes, stirring every 5 minutes. After 30 minutes, stir in corn syrup. Gradually add sugar, stirring until blended. Stir for an additional 3+ minutes (after all sugar is added) until the sugar is dissolved and no longer grainy.

Have several jars with lids prepared--clean them out with hot water and let dry prior to making jam. Fill containers within half an inch from the top, screw lids on, and let stand at room temperature for 24 hours.

Last step!
Freeze jars for 24 hours, then let thaw one at a time in fridge as needed. Enjoy!

The two jars that are redder than the others are the ones that had thawed in the fridge. The rest are still frozen.

That's it! This particular recipe requires no boiling, though the one with regular pectin does. It is so easy and so useful. With three large containers of strawberries, we made about twenty jars of jam. Shaina took ten and we took ten. Two are now thawed out in our fridge (the rest are sitting in the freezer) and we used some for toast this morning! It tastes AMAZING. Very sweet, but that's how I like my jam. I can't wait to make my own raspberry jam, and I'd even like to try doing a strawberry-rhubarb version.

If you have any questions about this recipe or if you tried it yourself and loved it, let me know by commenting below!