Strawberry Freezer Jam... B2B inspiration

This is about 3 pounds of berries. We picked a total of 9 pounds

Yesterday The Boy and I went to pick strawberries at our amazing local (20 minutes away) U-Pick farm. There were other moms there with their smaller children and it reminded me of my first trip to pick berries with my children. Picking those berries and making jam was some of my first inspiration for creating this blog. So many people have no idea how easy it is to make something so simple yet ads such joy and satisfaction. Yes it was a bit more work but including picking it only took about 4 hours to make all this jam. I worked pretty slow since the berries were small and I let the boy off the hook from helping with the berries since (I needed his help in other areas around the house :)

I used Pomona's universal pectin this time. I like it because you can use less sugar.
I followed the recipe in the box for a cooked jam but instead of canning I put it in the freezer.

The Freezer Jam I have done in the past I made in this way.

The first batch I used 1/2 cup honey and 1/2 cup sugar. FYI the honey recipe will always be a bit more runny but my family is fine with it.

For the rest I use a Cane sugar I got from Aldi last week and it looks like it has jelled nicely.

YUM!!!

10 minute home made strawberry ice cream without an icream maker!

So I was reading one of my Favorite Blogs the other day and she had posted about this "5 minute berry ice cream without an ice cream maker". I thought "hmmm I'm going to have to try that one day." One of the ingredients was heavy cream which I almost never purchase so I just added it to my "to try someday" file and forgot about it.

 A few days later I went to a local food distribution program and got all this heavy cream as part of a package deal.

So I decided to give the ice cream recipe a whirl!

I hauled out my trusty food processor (thank you swagbucks for helping me purchase this awesome kitchen tool!) 
I adapted This recipe a bit to make it easier for me and accommodate what I had available.

10 minute Strawberry Ice cream
Here is the Printable recipe

Ingredients:
4 cups frozen Strawberries, sliced, halved or quartered
1/2 - 3/4 cup of white sugar (adjust to your personal taste)
1/2 pint heavy cream (the cute tiny container)

Directions:
Add strawberries to your food processor.
Pour sugar over the berries.

Disclaimer: My pictures are not great for this post as I was impatient and it was super hot outside and I wanted to get this done and in the freezer ASAP! Also please ignore the weird stains on my very old counter tops. I have tried everything to remove them and they will not come off.

Pulse until the sugar and berries are mixed well and crushed pretty fine.

Slowly add in cream through the opening in the food processor. 
This part can get a bit frustrating if your processor is a smaller model like mine (it's and 8 cup vs. 12)  but if you take off the top and carefully move things around a bit with a wooden spoon (if you use a spatula you may cut it on the blade and if you use a spoon you could damage your blade) you will be all set. Turn on again and let it run until everything comes together. It will look all nice and slushy.

At this point you can put it in a container and freeze it so it gets nice and hard or you can serve it right away to you salivating children. I did both :)

This is what it looked like served right away

This stuff is AMAZING! I will say that I much preferred it after it had frozen solid. It scoops just like ice cream should and had a much nicer flavor I think after it had been in the freezer for 24 hours.

After serving this your family will definitely think you are the awesomest (yes it's a word, well today it is anyway) person in the whole universe!

If you find that you are getting lots of ice crystals next time stir your freezer mixture every 1/2 hour for a couple hours. It will help break them up.

Fresh Picked Strawberries!

So last week the kids and I went out to a local farm to pick strawberries. I was super happy find a place that still had berries available because most of the local farms were already picked out. I had meant to go the week before but I was knocked out by one of the nastiest bugs I have ever had.

It  took us about an hour to pick all this...

I think the boy ate at least a pint and he definitely ate more than he picked. The girl did well picking, a bonus of her growing up a bit but she ate quite a few in the field too :) It was a gorgeous day and we had a blast.

The best part to me about this whole venture was that the kids did all the hulling!

Wahoo!

Yay me!

Thanks kids!











I then made approximately 20 pints of freezer jam... Phew what a day! Last year I managed to stretch the jam out all the way to the end of the school year. Hopefully I can do that again because the kids really love it. Last year I tried 3 different recipes and below is our favorite.

My Freezer Jam recipe. Here is the printable Strawberry Freezer Jam

4 cups of crushed strawberries
1 package of no/low sugar pectin
1/2 cup of honey (local is best)
1 1/2 cups sugar (next time I will try even less sugar)
1/4 cup water

Whir up your berries in a food processor or blender, then put into a heat safe bowl.
Add 2 Tablespoons of Pectin to the berry mixture.
Add rest of pectin to a medium saucepan with the sugar, honey and water. Bring to a boil for 1 minute. You just want to heat it up and get everything blended. Turn off heat and add sugar mixture to berries. Mix well to blend ingredients.
Pour into prepared containers. Let cool for a few minutes before adding lids. I let mine cool completely before I put them into the freezer.



I forgot to take a picture of my pile of finished jam but the bottom of my 10CU ft freezer is FULL!

The jam did not use up all our berries. I filled 2 trays of sliced berries to freeze (what I used for ice cream (recipe to come). We also ate lots with vanilla yogurt or put them on top of vanilla  ice cream. They were so huge and delicious it was well worth the work and effort!

Delightfully sinful snack, well... maybee not so sinful :)

So most of my friends know that I am a big time Aldi shopper. Over the past few weeks they have had great strawberries at a great price ($1.19 per Pound). Now, strawberries are not my favorite to just eat by themselves due to their slightly tart nature but I found a solution! I made a few variations on a cream cheese dip for them.

Version 1 (not the healthiest)
2 ounces of 1/3 lees fat creme cheesed
2-3 Tablespoons of powdered sugar or to taste
1/4 Teaspoon vanilla

Warm Cream cheese for 10-20 seconds in Microwave or until spreadable but not hot. Mix in powdered sugar and vanilla.

Wash 5-6 strawberries, cut off tops and cube or slice berries.

Layer berries and cream cheese mixture into a bowl. Enjoy!

Version 2 (slightly healthier version)
1 ounce cream cheese
1/3 cup vanilla yogurt

Warm Cream cheese slightly and whisk with yogurt. Layer with washed berries.

Version 3 The healthiest way to go...
Layer washed berries with vanilla yogurt :)

want to make it even better?

Add some sliced banana and drizzle some warmed Nutella on top MMM....

I was amazed how full I was after eating this.
If you really love a cheesecake type flavor version 1 is for you. I like that and version 2 VERY much!

Considering I have a serious sweet tooth I was really happy with this snack. I tried not to "drown" the berries in the creme so I would not counteract all the strawberry goodness.

How will you treat yourself this week?