Curious about making jam in a bread machine? Here’s one woman’s experience trying it!
Most of the time, I make jam on my turquoise, 45 year old, electric stove. I’ve also made jam on a camp stove, on an induction burner, on a plain gas stove and even on a high-powered commercial gas range. And now, I’m someone who is making jam in a bread machine.
Several months ago, I spotted this post on the King Arthur Flour blog, in which they make a batch of strawberry jam in a Zojirushi bread machine. Being that I’m fascinated by all things having to do with jam making (don’t tell me you didn’t notice), I determined that this was something I wanted to try. In the interest of science, of course.
I got in touch with the folks at Zojirushi and they very nicely agreed to give me a review unit so that I could see how this whole bread machine jam thing worked. It arrived on my birthday (which was more than a month ago now) and I spent at least a week circling it warily, uncertain whether I wanted to trust my fruit to an automated machine that wouldn’t let me control the heat source.
Finally I unswaddled it from boxes and styrofoam, mashed up two cups of strawberries and got to work. The instructions that come with the Zojirushi say to combine 2 cups of crushed berries, 3/4 cup sugar and 1 teaspoon lemon juice. For the first round, I followed the instructions exactly and cooked the jam without any additional pectin.
Fruit, sugar and lemon juice go into the pan. Then you close the lid and set it to the jam setting (don’t be fooled by the 3:45 time in the picture above, I took that before I set it run the jam cycle. It only takes 1:20 to make jam in the Zojirushi). When the cooking time is up, the machine issues a couple of friendly beeps so that you can rush over and check on your jam (that is, if you weren’t hovering very nearby, occasionally lifting the lid a little to peek at the progress).
So here’s the good news. This machine, which was designed to bake bread, makes perfectly adequate jam. It gets quite hot, the paddles keep the jam moving to prevent any scorching and it’s dead easy to use. If you’re the type who likes to freeze fruit and make small batches of jam throughout the year, making your jam in a Zojirushi is a really good option. However, it has a major flaw as a jam maker and that is that with the lid closed, you’re just never going to get the necessary amount of evaporation to get a really thick jammy jam.
I did one batch without pectin (sorry, no pictures of the jam with pectin, I knocked it over just after pouring it into the jar and splattered my kitchen entirely in sticky fruit spray) and one with and both remained stubbornly runny and without the body that a good jam should have (though the batch with 2 teaspoons of powdered pectin did firm up more than the batch without).
The picture below pairs a stove cooked jam (on the left) with the jam cooked in this bread machine. You can see the difference in the body of the jam. The stove top jam reduced by more than 1/3 during cooking, resulting in a thick-set, glossy jam. The bread machine jam on the right is juicier and has saturated the bread with its syrup. Not a bad thing, but an imperfect thing to use on a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It would be perfect stirred into yogurt or drizzled on ice cream though.
I will say that I’ve been absolutely blown away by the quality of the bread that the Zojirushi makes. Of course I couldn’t resist using it to bake up a few loaves while it was hanging out in my kitchen and wow. We haven’t bought bread in weeks thanks to this machine.
The first time I made jam, I made it in a tiny kitchen with an “apartment” sized gas stove. It didn’t have enough juice to boil the water for canning and cook the jam at the same time (not to mention my pots were touching due to the size of the stove). I didn’t have a water canner, a jar lifter, funnel or pretty much any canning instrument – just a stock pot, a 2qt sauce pan and a regular pair of tongs. I nearly scalded myself when I dropped a jar after processing it. It was quiet an adventure but I’ve been hooked ever since. Thankfully I now have a decent sized kitchen, a regular sized stove and canning supplies.
My strawberry jam adventure is scheduled for this Friday. This is the second year I’m going out picking and jamming with my former boyfriend’s sister. That has the potential to be a good story, right?
We used to make mulberry jelly when I was a kid. So yummy! I haven’t done any jam or jelly making as an adult, but I’m ready to start!
I started making jam last year, both freezer jam and stove top. My best batch was white peach strawberry, only because I didn’t have enough peaches so I added some strawberries. Sometimes the best things are unplanned like that 🙂
I was going to can spiced peaches last year. The first batch was lovely because of the freestone peaches I used. The second batch ended up becoming peach butter because they weren’t freestone peaches. Nonetheless I love eating jam I canned myself on bread and in homemade yogurt as well.
The very first time I made grape jam i decided I needed to double the batch because of the abundance of grapes and did not use a big enough pan . I had no idea jam would melt part of a glass top stove!! It left little bubbles in it. The jam turned out nice though!!
Would love to win the Bread machine.
I made jam for the very first time two days ago. I found some lovely apricots at the farmer’s market and decided to give it a try. Something that makes bread and jam can’t be a bad thing at all.
Love your blog.
Grapefruit marmalade was my start in jam-making. I’m blown away by how tasty jam is when homemade, rather than store bought. So even though it had already been a long day at work, and the jam took hours to set — because I didn’t add pectin — my runny, silky, elixir of a grapefruit marmalade converted me to a DIY jam lady for life.
Last year I finally broke down and harvested scads of Crabapples in my yard. I figured, how hard would it be to make jam? Well, the making jam is the easy part, cleaning and pitting thousands of itsey bitsey fruits took hours!
The Jam came out wonderful, but I would really have to check my sanity to do it again! It would be great to try out the machine though. My current machine just does not have all the options.
I’ve only made jam once on the stove and failed miserably. I’d like another chance with this jam maker!
I’m surprised how terrible that jam turned out in the machine. Years ago, I started jam making by using my roommate’s bread machine (not that type). It was simple, tasty, great consistency, and needed no pectin added. I didn’t have to blend it first either. Just chopped and thrown in.
I have no great stories of making jam, except that I LOVE to make jam and I even took your Portland class last year making Pear Vanilla Jam. I popped open that puppy this week and am loving it!
Ah my! Been using a breadmaker from the goodwill that cost $4 and is on its last legs. This would be wonderful!
When we moved into this place, we discovered that we had a mature pear tree in the yard, so my first serious attempts at jam making were out of necessity. It was a bit of a trial by fire! I made spiced pear, pear with lime, pear with cardamom, pear chutney with cranberries and raisins, etc. etc. etc. A single tree has a lot of pears – Needless to say, I’ve caught the canning bug now, and I make salsa, fruit sauces, pickles, and relishes, too. I give home canned things as gifts and people seem to really like it. I love it when my middle aged friends ask for the recipes becausemy canned goodies remind them of things they had eaten from their grandma’s table!
This year I’ll be volunteering with the Society of St. Andrew (gleaning for the food insecure) and I hope to be able to share a bit of homemade sunshine in a jar with some of the folks with whom I’ll be sharing produce. Who knows — maybe I’ll throw in baked goods, too! 🙂
What a great giveaway! Thanks for always thinking of your faithful readers!
Never made jam before. Maybe something like this would be a way to ease into it… I find it an interesting concept that a bread machine can make jam. What about peanut butter? 🙂
I first made jam as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Kazakhstan. The family I lived with had a very large garden and a ‘summer kitchen’ that was really a camping stove top located within a gazebo. I’ve been hooked on eating and making homemade jam ever since. As summer has hit my non-air conditioned apartment in Chicago, I dream of a camp stove top under a gazebo. (That said, I am thrilled with indoor plumbing.)
My fiance and I made our traditional (ball recipe) strawberry freezer jam for our wedding reception last year. It was a huge hit and whatever leftovers might have existed ended up going home with people as extra favors.
I had no idea that Zojirushi made bread makers. We have one of their rice cookers and love it, so it would be interesting to see how the bread maker did. And it would be great to have some home made bread to try with our most recent batch of freezer jam.
OOOH! a NEW ZOJI I have 2 that are 15-20 years old…I’m like you haven’t tried to make jam in them yet. We have fruit trees and I do put up peach, apricot jam, but only on the stove so far. GREAT BREAD and hamburger rolls.
Would love to have the newest member.
It never would have occurred to me to use a bread machine to make jam! I LOVE LOVE LOVE homemade bread and would equally love to win this give-away! Thanks to Zojirushi for their generosity!
I started out making jam by making Apple Butter with my mom (Grandma’s Recipe!) from our own Gravenstein Apples. Aside from getting burned on the splatting, it was a glorious experience. The small-batch concept is new to me, but is making me infinitely more productive!! Just made my dad some Seedless Blackberry (his favorite) for Dad’s day… I’d LOVE the bread-maker/jam-maker machine!!
In preparation of making peach jam, my BF and I headed to a pick your own place and stocked up on gorgeous, juicy peaches. Forgetting how we got there as we picked, it turned out to be quite hysterical trying to get the peaches situated – without crushing – in the saddlebags of his Harley.
I would love to make bread and jam in this!
OOOH! breadbaking is on my list for this year. So when I was 9 months pregnant, I had a LOT of mandarin oranges. So I tried a marmalade recipe. Did not work. Tried again (overdue for the babe). Didn’t work. Next day over due date, tried again. Still sucked…I think I made about 10 batches before I threw in the towel, since I still had no baby. I can’t imagine the time for that indulgence now!
Maybe now I have a great excuse for getting a bread maching..?
First time poster, some time jammer-canner, savvy reader of Food In Jars. Today is my birthday. My Dad offered to buy me the Zo Bread Machine as a gift but, having a perfectly good Bread Man, I couldn’t justify the expense and opted for some cookbooks instead, including the Blue Chair Jam cookbook. When I saw the title of this post I thought: Oh, Carp! I made a bad choice! So, glad to hear it didn’t work out! 🙂 Doesn’t mean I wouldn’t love to win the bread machine, though: another of the cookbooks acquired is the Bread Lovers Bread Machine cookbook. Thanks for the lovely and informative blog.
Awesome! I’ve made some crazy things in a rice cooker, but never thought about a bread machine! I made my first ever batch of jam last year out of fresh picked Apricots and have been hooked ever since! I have a watermelon waiting for me at home tonight as a matter of fact to make some more!!!
the first time we made strawberry jam, we didn’t use pectin, and we stirred and stirred and stirred. We did about 10 freezer tests, and finally just canned it because it had changed color, and we were so insecure that we thought it HAD to be done. Luckily the kids really liked it anyway!
That’s cool. I’ve only ever made jam on a regular stove, although I did use a slow cooker to make some blueberry butter. Forgot to cover it and there are still splatters on the wall!
interesting idea to make jam in the bread maker?!
I don’t make jam much (mostly I freeze fruit), but do make applesauce a lot. I had toyed with the thought of making apple butter, but was always afraid I’d burn it. Then one day I was simmering a pot of applesauce and forgot about it (for several hours). Voila, apple butter!
OMG please add me to the drawing for the bread machine! I have their pressurized rice cooker and would love to add a bread machine to the set! I have been making bread every morning by hand and the idea of dropping in the ingredients and running would be pure heaven.
When I was a kid, we lived on 2 acres of woodland, and we had a profusion of wild violets every spring. For several years, my grandmother and I would pick violets and make a beautiful light purple jelly. One year, though, we overdid it. My brother and I picked so many violets blossoms that year, that we had several jars of violet jelly to give away. Unfortunately, we had picked so many of the purple violet flowers that they did not get to set seed, and from that year forward, our violet population skewed toward the white variety. For about 10 years, we could not get enough purple violets to make jelly. The moral must be: Everything, even violet jelly, in moderation.
My jam story is that I have never made jam! But perhaps I would with this multitalented machine. 😉
My story is from making jelly. Pepper jelly! Boy did I learn my lesson about wearing gloves and handling jalapenos. Before it was all over, I had given myself a jalapeno facial which included the initial jalapeno juice peel followed by a yogurt bath, a milk facial splash, a vinegar toner and finally an aloe mask. Needless to say, the jelly turned out wonderful and a few days later, I had a healthy, youthful glow (once the redness subsided). I’d love to try this method. I just made blueberry butter in the slow cooker this past weekend.
I use my old bread machine(15 yrs old) to make only dough. Never thought one could make jam.
I just made a small batch of strawberry jam from your small batch recipe and picked enough strawberries to do another batch. I love that I don’t have to have huge amounts of strawberries. Thank you.
I just tried making jam recently – using your strawberry jam recipe from the other week. It came out so good! I can see how easy it is to become addicted to jam making.
My bread machine has a jam setting too, but I have been too wary to use it yet. Maybe I’ll give it a try. I love making berry jams and the occasional “syrup” from forgetting to put in any pectin!
I’ve been procrastinating on a bread machine. Can you get a good, heavy, dense, textured bread? I’d love to try homemade jam. Would cooking it longer help?
I am hopefully going to learn how to make jam this summer, but making it in a bread machine seems much less intimidating to me for some reason. This is a great giveaway! Thanks so much.
I have never made jam but would love to! I have received some from neighbors and my son is a PB&J fanatic! Since I try to only feed him organic foods I spend a ton of money on jars of jam for him. This would help with that AND the organic bread!
I tried to make jam last summer from some of the many, many raspberries that I got from my raspberry bushes in my backyard. It was a disaster. I tried to make it from a recipe online on the stove. Either it was too hot or I wasn’t paying close enough attention because it burned to the bottom of the pan, and took over a day of soak/scrub intervals to clean it. Since then, I’ve left the jam making to others. I’d love to give it another shot, this way sounds very interesting!
I’ve never participated in the process, but my parents canned an awful lot of chokecherry jams and syrups one summer. All of those jars were my drinking glasses in my first apartment. 🙂
I love strawberry freezer jam, but whatever I use it on has to be eaten right away…pbj sandwhiches. and it’s so easy. But I can’t get my family to eat it so I end up making jelly the old fashion way!
My favorite bread machine jam was not actually jam, it was a peach chutney, recipe available in The Bread Machine Bible. It was so easy, and my kids ate it on everything, but it was best on pizza, I think. My favorite jam story was the plum jam – we have a tree that went CRAZY two years ago, after we filled a whole box worth of quart freezer bags we made jam for two days straight, and we still had wasted fruit.
would love to try this bread machine to make jam!!
I’ve only made blackberry jam with my mom. I spent 3 days picking the berries. The last day I forgot to put sunscreen on. I was so sunburned the next day that I couldn’t help cook I just sat and watched.
When I was visiting my folks in the Texas Panhandle this time last year, there were trees all over town dripping with apricots. I decided it was time to teach the nieces and nephews the fine art of jam. We loaded up the crew to collect the bounty. I may have gotten a little carried away… we ended up with 28 quarts of fresh apricots! Much fun was had, much jam was made, many more were frozen for later endeavors.
Thanks so much for the chance to win! I’ve only made freezer jam so far, but both times my husband and I made it together so that made it extra fun 🙂
The first time I made jam was after picking delicious peaches up in VA. We were all beginners so it was fun to figure it all out using a recipe that had been passed down in my family!
I made my very first stovetop “jam” last week with some leftover berries, then spooned it warm over vanilla ice cream. It was delicious. I’m looking forward to more jamming experiments!
Just found your website through a friend…I love bread and jam!