Today, we have a fairly simple Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipe. We love persimmons, well ok some of us love them, some of us not so much, but we got them anyway. This year, we harvested a lot of Persimmons from the local “you-pick” persimmon farm. When we say we picked persimmons, we mean we picked A LOT of them. There were 4 buckets by the time we were done; bucket 1 weighed 13lbs, buckets 2 and 3 weighed 14lbs each, and bucket 4 weighed 15lbs. Some of the family eat them like apples. The large tortoises also love them. Some kinds of persimmons are crisp like an apple when they are ready, so they will last a good while. But as you can imagine, they do not last forever. And what do you do with all of those fruits? You make jam, of course.
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This is a pretty simple Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipe with only three required ingredients, but you can add others or substitute some as you like. That is one of the joys of homemade jams, you can make them just to your own liking. Not to mention, you know exactly what is in it, it is better for you, and it tastes better than store-bought stuff. And of course, learning to make homemade jams is another step in your journey to becoming more self-sufficient.
To make this Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipe:
persimmons
lemon or lime juice or citric acid
sugar or honey
Other spices are optional to your taste preference
As we have a lot of persimmons, we are going to make a pretty large batch. The general ratio is 4lbs of persimmons should give you about 12 cups of sliced or diced fruit. 1 to 2 cups of sugar or honey. Although honey is sweeter, so you may want to use a bit less, depending on your taste preference. ¼ cup of lemon or lime juice per 1lb of sliced fruit. You can go up to ½ cup of juice if you like a more tart jam.
1lb fruit = 1 to 2 cups sugar = ¼ cup to ½ cup juice
There are so many ways to tweak this recipe so you can make it exactly as you want it.
We are going to go with the most basic Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipe.
1. Wash and core persimmons. Make sure to get the seeds and center core out and any leaves or stems that are still there. You can peel them if you like.
2. Slice, dice, or smash the fruit as you chose.
We did not peel our persimmons, but we did put them into the blender after we cut them up. The blender makes them cook faster, and you do not have to wait for them to “cook apart”.
We tried cutting the persimmons up and cooking them first, but this just took too long.
The mashed persimmon from the blender cooked much faster and was smoother.
After we cored and cut up our fruit, we had 20lbs of clean, ready to cook persimmon.
3. In a large bowl, add the sugar and lemon juice to the chopped fruit.
Make sure to weigh out your cut-up fruit so you get the correct ratio for lemon juice to fruit.
For each 4lbs of persimmon, we used 2 cups of sugar and ½ cup of lemon juice.
4. Add all to a large cooking pot on the stove.
5. Cook the fruit mix for about 15 min, stirring to keep it from burning to the bottom or scorching.
You may want to taste test to be sure you have the sweetness that you want. If you want more sweet, add a bit more sugar or honey.
If you did not blend your persimmons up at the start, they should be falling apart by this point. A potato masher will help speed this process if you want.
6. Cover and cook on medium for about 30min. Be sure you still often.
7. Test for thickness and remove from heat when the jam is just a bit thinner than you want the final jam to be, as it will thicken a bit as it cools.
8. Turn off the heat.
9. Carefully, pour jam into glass jars. Leave about ¼ inch at the top.
A. Fridge Jam
Now, if you are just making fridge jam, let it cool a bit, then put the lids on. Let the jam cool completely before putting it in the fridge.
B. Water Bath Canning Jam
If you are water bath canning for long-term storage, you will need to have your water bath and sterile jars ready before you start the jam cooking.
11. Seal the canning lids onto the jars. Be sure you use the two-part canning lids for this.
12. Fill a water bath pot with water.
13. Carefully place the jars in the water.
14. Boil for 10 to 12 min.
15. Remove from water bath and let cool.
You should hear the tin click when the jars seal as they cool.
16. Place in a cool pantry until ready to use.
Once you open the jar, you will want to put it in the fridge.
When we finished making our Homemade Persimmon Jam, we had 28 pints of jam.
As we did our initial research on persimmon jam, we found several different ways it can be done. You can peel and core them like an apple. They can be cored to remove the seeds and center, but leave the skins on. Most of the skins will dissolve while cooking. This just depends on how you want to do it. There does not seem to be much difference in the final product. If you want a very smooth jam, you can peel them and then blend well after the cooking.
Another thing that varies is what acid to use. Lemon or lime juice are both a very good natural acid to make jam with. The standard ratio is 1 Tablespoon of juice per 1lb of fruit. This is enough to make it safe to can. But you can also use citric acid and dissolve it in the water before you add the fruit. Again, this depends on how you want to do it.
And there is also the addition of extra spices for a variety of flavors. Most of the time, there are no spices added; it is just the persimmon flavor. But if you want, you can add cinnamon, cloves, ginger, or whatever spice you want to give your persimmon jam a special kick.
Another thing about this recipe is that you can water bath can it for long-term storage, or you can just keep it in the fridge. This will depend on what you are planning to do with it and how long you will need it to keep. But you can go either way.
Do note: if you are canning for long-term storage, 1 Tablespoon of lemon or lime juice per 1lb of fruit is the minimum to make it safe for water bath canning.
Side Note: As we had so many persimmons, we tried dehydrating some.
1. Wash, slice thin.
2. Place on dehydrator tray.
3. Dehydrate for about 24hrs.
4. Remove from tray and place in sealed bag.
Our persimmon pieces were still warm when we took them out of the dehydrator, so we decided to put the bag in the fridge to keep them from getting soggy.
This was a fun experiment. We ended up with very thin, very crisp, very glass-like persimmon candy. It is sweet, crisp, and somehow chewy at the same time. And yes, it totally gets stuck in your teeth.
There are several different variations of Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipes. But as we said, we just went with the most basic Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipe. You can experiment with yours as you like to get exactly what you want. You may find that you like your persimmon jam in several different flavors.
We hope you have enjoyed this Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipe. Try it out, do some experimenting, and see how much better the Homemade Persimmon Jam Recipe is when compared to the store-bought stuff.
If you are interested in some of our other talks, please see the ones below.
Fall Spices For Your Health: Sprinkle Them, Bake Them, Drink Them
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Great taste!!