Fresh Strawberries - Mixed Berry Jam

As the weather is so grotty I knew that the rain would start making the Strawberries go to mush. Yes we have fresh strawberries in the garden!!! I have always grown sucessful strawberries and so far we are on our second cropping with more flowers coming on. The only problem is that my third crops never ripen as it gets too cold.

Anyway, I picked about 250g of strawberries and was stuck with what to do with that amount. We had Strawberries and Meringues just last week. So I thought that I would put together a mixed berry jam as the first lot I made in the height of the soft fruit season was all finished. Gosh it was good. I still have a lot of fruit frozen to deal with "some other time", so that time is now.

In a pot goes on low heat
250g frozen blackcurrants
250g frozen redcurrants
250g frozen blackberries
500g frozen raspberries

Put a lid on and let the fruit soften and thaw, the juices should start running. I then added
1/2c water
250g chopped fresh strawberries and brought it all to a simmer.

Into the pot goes 1400g sugar and stir until well dissolved. Let simmer for 5 minutes, add the juice of 1 lemon and let simmer for another 5 minutes (the longer cooking time is for the currants). Take it off the heat and stir for 5 minutes, leave for 5 minutes and stir for another 2-3 minutes. (What this does is ensure that the fruit evenly distributes through the jar when setting - prevents the jams where you get the fruit rising to the top)

Put into clean sterilised jars and put lids on securely.

There was a little left over that I put in the fridge. I then made a batch of raspberry jam using the same utensils - saves me washing. By the time that was done we needed to try it all. A batch of pikelets later with the taste testers declaring it scrummy!!!!