Hi, I’m Jenny and I blog at The Domestic Wildflower where I share homemade food & craft tutorials. I’ve been canning as an adult since I was pregnant with my first child. Some women nest by painting baby rooms; I nested by teaching myself to make 100 jars of canned applesauce. Later, I started my blog to share canning recipes and home projects and found that water bath canning, while fun and satisfying, took too long for many busy, modern moms. When I found the steam canner, it truly changed things for me. I was able to can so many more batches, and get them all done during my kids’ naptime! I was able to fit in canning into little pockets of time where I never was able with regular water bath canning and I knew it was the ticket for helping a regular, stressed, busy-to-the-max mom make canning work for her.


Now, I ONLY use the steam canner and I have several resources designed to help beginners available at www.startcanning.com.  I can to make healthy snacks for my kids (in little half pint jars so I don’t have to dish them up- they can just take them to-go!), fruit cups for me to eat at my desk, jam for gifts and for my husband’s favorite peanut butter sandwich, and tomato sauce, the dinner time workhorse that has no added sugar and can be used for countless recipes. Gone is the era of marathon canning. Here is the age of canning as an easy, fast add on to your cooking routine that saves time and money.


Whether you make this recipe in Victorio’s steam canner or in their beautiful traditional water bath canner, which can be used for either steam canning or water bath canning, it’s a quick one. By using the steam canner, you’ll be DONE in about 20 minutes. The Fast Raspberry Jam is a perfect first recipe because it is high in acid (so it is super safe) and high in pectin (so it stiffens easily). Raspberries are also one of my favorites to pick with my kids at a U-Pick- no thorns!

Homemade Raspberry Jam

Ingredients:

3.5 pounds raspberries (about 7 cups)

2/3 cup bottled lemon juice

1 1/2 cup sugar

1.75-ounce box of powdered pectin-optional if a firm jam is desired


1. Prepare your water bath canning pot or your steam canner. Fill the water bath canning pot with water, add 5 pint jars, and bring to a boil OR fill the steam canner to fill line and turn on low with the 5 pint jars nearby on a towel-covered countertop.


2. Combine raspberries, sugar, and lemon juice and bring to a boil in the preserving pan (a heavy bottomed, wide pan) mashing with a potato masher or wooden spoon.


3. If desired, whisk in pectin, a little at a time, quickly. Boil for 1-2 minutes longer.


4. Ladle into jars one at a time, maintain ½ inch headspace, and apply lids and rings, and either submerge into the boiling water of the boiling water bath with a jar lifter  OR set gently on the rack of the steam canner.


5. Process for 10 minutes PLUS 5 minutes for every 1000 ft above sea level. Remove from heat, rest jars carefully on towel covered countertop. Label cooled jars and store for up to 1 year.raspberry jam in gift able canning jars

I invite you to check out the additional steam canning resources at www.startcanning.com which include the Steam Canning Workshop and the Steam Canning for Beginners Ebook. The feeling of handing your kids wholesome little jars of applesauce or spreading delicious jam on your family’s breakfast is one I can’t wait to share with you all. Check out my blog, The Domestic Wildflower for tons of recipes; I include steam canner and traditional water bath instructions in every recipe!  

Jenny the post author from the domestic wildflower.com