Another summer week, another cherry recipe! For this one, I referred to the method Chocolate Moosey shared here, which is very simple and pectin-free–just what I was looking for. I don’t necessarily have anything against pectin. I’m just lazy not one for extra steps and ingredients. I did make a few tweaks to the recipe, such as cutting out a lot of the sugar and using frozen cherries. I received a generous cherry delivery from Northwest Cherry Growers a few weeks back and, even after giving some to family and friends, making this cobbler, this cocktail, and a few other things y’all will see in the next couple of weeks, there was no way I could eat them all before they went bad, so I froze a few pounds. Thankfully, frozen cherries work almost interchangeably with fresh ones in many recipes! This easy sweet cherry jam is one of them. Another is the yummy no-churn ice cream I shared last week.
This jam requires only two ingredients: cherries and sugar. That’s even simpler than my cherry compote! The possibilities for using the finished product are endless: pastry filling, spread on toast, PB & J sandwiches, yogurt parfaits, and more. I slathered mine on some easy drop biscuits and it was such a simple little pleasure. As I previously mentioned in this post, I still haven’t gotten around to testing out scratch biscuit recipes so I just used Bisquick mix and added a bit of almond extract to it for that cherry and almond flavor combination I love so much. One of these days, I’ll fool around with scratch biscuits and let y’all know how that goes. This recipe makes enough for one small jar, so you won’t end up with more cherry jam than you know what to do with.
I hope you’ll try easy sweet cherry jam out for yourself. Since you can use either fresh or frozen cherries, there’s no rush (although, why wait?). Next week, I’ll be back with another easy cherry recipe. Tequila may or may not be involved. 🙂 Thanks for reading!
- 2 cups cherries fresh or frozen, pitted
- 1/3 cup sugar
- Place a small plate in the freezer. Chop cherries then add them plus the sugar to a small deep pot over medium heat.
- Stir well then allow to come to a boil. Continue to cook, stirring regularly until the jam starts to thicken. It took about 25 minutes total for my batch of jam but cooking times may vary so use the next step to be sure.
- Check for readiness by removing the plate from the freezer and placing a small bit of jam on it. Turn the plate sideways and if the jam slides down slowly, it's ready. If is slides down quickly, it needs to cook longer and if it does not slide or does so very slowly, it's overdone. Note: It's still usable. It will just be harder to spread.
- Spoon jam into a glass jar or other sealable container and allow to cool. Store in the fridge. Should keep up to two weeks.
My mom made some homemade jam and I’ve wanted to try ever since!
You should definitely give it a try, Jenna! This method is so easy.
You had me at “easy” and “cherry”. My two favorite words, so I know I’ll love the recipe.
Well since I just bought a whole bunch of bread yesterday 🙂
I bet this would be really good paired with some cream cheese on a fluffy bagel 😀
It definitely would! Thanks for stopping by.
Cherry Jam is my #1 favorite thing. Making for sure!
Oh my goodness, I have to make this for my kids! They love cherries and 2 ingredients makes the recipe sound doable. Thanks!!
It’s definitely doable. I hope they love it!
Can I use this recipe in a water bath process?
Hi, Waunita! I’ve not tried a water bath process with this so I can’t say with certainty but I don’t see why it wouldn’t work—I assume you mean canning or jarring?