Canning Raspberry Jam!

 Sorry this post is a couple days late but we have been super busy and we traveled all day today. 


On Tuesday, my cousin Abby and I headed over to Mason Farms down the road from my Nana and Papa's house to pick Red Raspberries. You can go pick any fruits and vegetables yourself at a discounted price. It is awesome! 


We ended up picking 3 quarts which cost $16.50! If you do not pick them yourself...you pay about $30! It is craziness! It almost makes me want to move, buy a bunch of land and grow a HUGE farm/garden that people can either pick their own or sell them for a nice profit. haha 

This is half of the bucket of raspberries we picked. Now if you are wondering what we were planning on using them for...I will tell you...Making Jam! I have never canned before but my Nana has and still does. She has the Canning Kit so I had asked if we could do this. As you can see...she said yes! 

We washed all the fruit and then I started to mash them up with a potato masher. This part only took about 5-10 minutes. I mixed the pectin with the sugar as directed. 

Next, I boiled the raspberries with a small portion of the pectin/sugar mixture. It has to come to a rolling boil before you can add the rest of the sugar. Then boil for exactly 1 minute. 

 Me mixing away! My arm was getting tired because it takes it awhile to come to a rolling boil. 

 Before we transferred the jam into the jars, we washed, boiled and air dried the jars. This was very simple and easy to do. Now a fun story comes into play right about now...you see 6 small jars of jam in the next picture you will see 3 large ones added. 


When we were filling up the small jars we realized that we had a lot of jam left over and no jars! So thankfully, there is a Dollar General store about 5 minutes from my Nana and Papa's house. Abby and I rushed to the store and picked up a pack of 12 jars (only quantity they sold them in...cost $7.50). 

Here is the finished product! 3 large jars and 6 small jars! I gave 4 away (2 to nana, 1 to my uncle and 1 to my aunt)...they called me Martha Stewart! haha 


Total Spent: 


- $16.50 for raspberries
- $2.00 for pectin 
- $1.89 for 3 jars (other 9 will be used this weekend...Nana is canning my tomatoes and peppers)
-----------------------
Grand Total: $20.39 or $1.70 per jar (3 large ones = 2 small) 


I love this price because I pay about $5 - $6 per jar from a farmer's market. 


I also purchased a basket of 8 tomatoes, 4 green peppers, 4 chili peppers, 1 banana pepper and 4 cucumbers marked down to $4!  This is only $0.19 per item!!!! All because they had an imperfection. Made me happy! 


The tomatoes and peppers will be canned together by my Nana and Papa. We ran out of time to finish this...well we were a bit too stressed out after the jam to continue on. haha 


For my birthday, I will be asking for a canning kit! Any suggestions! Thanks!