Spiced Christmas Jam the Holiday recipe. For a few years now, I have enjoyed giving homemade preparations to family and friends. Two years ago, the choice fell on the Hot Chocolate Mix, last year on the Chocolate Liqueur, and this year comes a delicious and fragrant Christmas Jam. A particular and unusual jam perfect for breakfast, to spread on a slice of warm bread, but also delicious to accompany cheeses, whether aged or fresh. The preparation is a bit lengthy because you need to prepare all the fruit you need and cut it into small pieces. A delicious scent of spices makes it perfect right in this period and instantly festive. I prefer to enjoy the jam with pieces to taste all the different flavors that compose it, but if you prefer, you can blend it at the end of cooking with an immersion blender. Apples, pears, dried figs, dried plums, and dried apricots, and then lots of spices are the ingredients of this fantastic Winter Fruit Compote. Don’t be intimidated by the large number of ingredients and follow my advice for a result that will surprise you. I also recommend not missing the recipe for the Pear and Cinnamon Jam. Let’s then head to the kitchen and prepare together a delicious Spiced Jam with Apples and Pears
AND DON’T MISS THESE RECIPES AS WELL:
- Difficulty: Easy
- Cost: Medium
- Rest time: 1 Day
- Preparation time: 30 Minutes
- Portions: For 6-7 jars of jam
- Cooking methods: Stove
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: Autumn, Winter, Christmas
- Energy 89.17 (Kcal)
- Carbohydrates 17.41 (g) of which sugars 13.87 (g)
- Proteins 0.73 (g)
- Fat 1.18 (g) of which saturated 0.02 (g)of which unsaturated 0.04 (g)
- Fibers 1.15 (g)
- Sodium 1.67 (mg)
Indicative values for a portion of 40 g processed in an automated way starting from the nutritional information available on the CREA* and FoodData Central** databases. It is not food and / or nutritional advice.
* CREATES Food and Nutrition Research Center: https://www.crea.gov.it/alimenti-e-nutrizione https://www.alimentinutrizione.it ** U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service. FoodData Central, 2019. https://fdc.nal.usda.gov
Ingredients for the Christmas Jam
- 14 oz apples
- 14 oz pears
- 3.5 oz raisins
- 1 3/4 cups red wine
- 2 cups sugar
- 5.64 oz dried apricots
- 2.82 oz walnuts
- 5.64 oz dried figs
- 5.64 oz dried plums (pitted)
- 1 orange (untreated)
- 1 lemon (untreated)
- 3/4 cup rum
- 4 star anise
- 6 cloves
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 pinch nutmeg
How to prepare the Spiced Christmas Jam
Wash the apples, pears, orange, and lemon. Without peeling them, first clean and cut the pears and apples into small cubes. Transfer them into a large bowl. Remove the peel from the lemon and orange without the white part and cut it into thin strips. Squeeze the lemon and orange and add the juice and zest into the bowl.
Also add the raisins, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and red wine. Cut the dried fruit, apricots, plums, and figs, into small pieces and add them to the preparation.
Mix well. To recover the spices at the end of preparation: star anise and cloves, I inserted them in a tea infuser, but you can also simply insert them in a closed gauze to easily recover them at the end of cooking.
Cover the bowl and let it rest in the fridge for 18-24 hours. After the resting time, transfer everything into a saucepan and let the jam cook over medium heat for about an hour and a half. Stir it often, and halfway through cooking, add the rum.
To test the cooking, I use the plate method. Place a plate in the fridge to cool. Pour a teaspoon of jam on the plate, and if it is ready, it will firm up immediately, and tilting the plate, it won’t slide. If it’s ready, add the coarsely chopped walnuts, mix well, and turn off the heat.
Pour the Christmas Jam boiling into clean jars. Close the jars and turn them upside down until completely cooled. Store them in a cool, dark place. Once a jar is opened, keep it in the fridge for a few days.
“For this recipe, I slightly modified a recipe from a friend who had read it in a Facebook group of Pustertal recipes given by Mr. Valerio D’Agnese, comparing it with many others found online”
See you tomorrow with a new recipe, a hug, Loredana
Loredana’s Tips
If you prefer not to add certain spices, you can do so or replace them with another, for example, ginger and cardamom work very well
Also, don’t miss the recipe for Soft Orange and Chocolate Cookies
