"Black and Blue" Jilly Jam

I love making jam, and making up fun names for my jams is a big part of why I love it hahaha. For years and years I've been making 'Jilly Jam' with silly names like 'berry peach screech' and 'so good it's scary blueberry' or 'berry barbie' (strawberry rhubarb); this time I wanted to combine black and blueberries and make 'black and blue' jam - and it turned out amazingly good! Like so so good I couldn't wait for breakfast toast and jam the next morning. 

I have no idea where I got it but in my cooking stash is 3 boxes of pectin of "Pomona's Universal Pectin" for lower sugar recipes, I followed their basic instructions with a couple changes. Here's what I did:

• 6 cups mixed black and blueberries
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 3 teaspoons pectin
• 3 teaspoons calcium water (came in the box with the pectin, I've never seen that before)
• 1 teaspoon butter, optional (it helps cut down the foam that forms when boiling the fruit)

note: I like my jam to be chunky so I don't mash the fruit too much, I chop it with one of those handheld circle things (know what I mean? I have no idea what it's called - it's a sharp ring with a handle). You can totally mash it to your preference tho, a potato masher works good for that. 

Put the fruit, lemon juice, and calcium water in a pan and bring to a full roiling boil. Meanwhile combine the sugar and pectin in a separate bowl. Once the fruit is boiling add the sugar/pectin mixture and stir vigorously for a couple minutes until the sugar is dissolved, add the butter if you have a lot of foam. Remove from heat.

Ladle the jam into sterilized, hot jars (if you have a canning funnel it'll keep things way cleaner) leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Wipe the rims with a wet paper towel, top with a hot canning lid, screw on the ring. Process in a hot water bath for 10 minutes, carefully remove the jars (I use long tongs) and set aside too cool. When you've heard the jar make a  'ping' sound you know they've sealed. Push the center of the lid, it should not have any give - if it does then it didn't seal and you need to store those jars in the fridge.

This recipe made 6 small jars of jam (I like to put jam in the really small jam jars, I think 4 oz?, when I have them - so I made 3 small jars and 6 mini jars), plus a little bit more that I just put in a covered container in the fridge (pictured above). 

Note: I didn't write out all the canning instructions, you can go online to see more on prepping to can (sterilizing jars, putting the lids in a small saucepan of hot water, having a large pot of water boiling to be ready to process the jars once you've filled them - none of it is hard, I just don't want to type the whole thing and instructions will come in the pectin box!)

Mini Hand Pies

These are a little bit time consuming, not gonna lie, but they aren't hard and they are very, very, very good. It's totally worth the extra assembly time - they are delish, easy to transport and eat, perfect picnic food, and making dessert in miniature form always makes them better for some reason ;)

I did use a couple shortcuts, I mean it when I say they are simple to make!

Ingredients:
-prepared pie crust (I use the rolled up kind found in the dairy section)
-berry jam (for these I used store-bought strawberry and homemade blackberry)
-strawberries if desired to make the filling a little thicker
-cornstarch if the jam is too runny
-egg wash (beat one egg with a tiny bit of water in a small bowl)
-coarse sugar

Directions:
-heat oven to 350'
-roll out pie crust until it's a little thinner than if you were making a full pie
-cut out 2.5" circles using a cookie cutter or glass that measures approx that size. note you can make these any size you want but after testing out different sizes (I tried larger 3.5" and also folding a circle in half) but ultimately the little 2.5" won out. make sure you have an even number of circles since you need a top and bottom for each hand pie
-put down a circle on a parchment lined baking sheet, top with a little bit of jam and a small piece of fruit
-brush egg wash around the edges of the circle (top and bottom), lay the top circle on the bottom circle encasing the jam
-using a fork crimp the edges together all the way around
-brush the tops with egg wash, sprinkle with coarse sugar, and poke a couple little holes in the top for steam to escape.
-bake for 20-22 minutes until golden brown.

Note: I did a test batch before making a whole pan of these which was good because I used way too much filling and a lot of it oozed out. Experiment with one or two to see how much jam you need to fill the pies without it all leaking out - with the strawberry jam I found it was too runny while baking so I added a bit of cornstarch and some diced strawberries to make it a little thicker. My homemade blackberry jam is super thick so worked perfectly. You want as much filling as you can without it all oozing out! I used two boxes of pie crust and ended up with 44 hand pies not counting my experimental ones. 44 sounds like a lot but they'll go fast!

these are my "testers" -  too much filling!

before baking

after baking - the 2 blackberry on the right held their filling
but the strawberry really oozed out. I adjusted the rest of the
strawberry by adding a little cornstarch and chopped fruit before
filling the pies. 

mmmmmm...mini pie goodness