I Just Spent $60 on Blueberries

After moving to Maine I noticed a very obvious trend. Canning was apparently very popular in New England. I never thought about canning before. My sister-in-law makes this amazing raspberry jam and jars it for everyone to enjoy, yet it never even crossed my mind to do it myself. It wasn't until I started really noticing the displays in stores that I started to think about doing it myself. It was during my frugal week, so I went to the library and took out some books on preserving food. I read some and then thought about what I wanted to make. I thought for a good week before I decided that I was going to make blueberry jam. I'm living in Maine and most of my family and friends aren't. I wanted to give them all a piece of Maine. I set off on my quest to get the berries. I won't go into all the details because they aren't that interesting, so I will cut to the chase.

This morning I picked up 15 pounds of wild Maine blueberries from Jordan's Farm. And then, after dinner, armed with An Idiots Guide to Preserving Food and a web video about making really fast and easy jam I set out to make some jam.

Before I started cooking I turned to Jeremy and said, "You know, I don't really like blueberries" as I watched him eat them by the handful from the box. Jeremy looked at me with that annoyed look he gives me when I admit to doing something ridiculous, like spending $60 on a fruit I don't even like. As I made the jam I thought about all my feelings that I have about blueberries and by the end, I was pretty sure that I understood it. Blueberries are great as long as they are cooked, raw... I'm not too crazy about.

I made a very small test batch, only about 10 ounces, and I really like it. Jeremy and I tested it on peanut butter and buttered toast and we cannot decide which we like best.

Here is what I did... I watched this video from The New York Times entitled The Minimalist: Fast Blueberry Jam and did exactly what he did. I added a tad of sugar and some lemon, other than that, it is all berries.

Then I jarred them and used a boiling water canner to seal the jars. When I was finished, I had two full jars and one half. But, now there is only one jar left :)