Like a warm hug or a bottle of love, nothing takes you home like a jar of blueberry preserves with brown sugar. Brown sugar jams work with any fruit, including strawberries and peaches.
I love jam. Actually, I ADORE jam. I grew up with homemade jam. Every morning, as a kid in Iran, I would make little lavash bites with feta and jam.
I continued this morning ritual when we moved to the U.S. using toast, as we could not find lavash, and cream cheese instead of feta. Today, I use jam sparingly, trying to cut the calories, but I still have a soft spot for a jar of homemade jam.
I come from a family full of jam makers – it’s what we do. It could be strawberry-rhubarb jam, peach jam or quince jam we love our jam.
Store-bought jam doesn’t bring the memories or nostalgia as homemade jam. Whenever my aunt visits, she has a jar of jam for me. I happily take it and savor each morsel. Love in a jar.
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Recipe highlights
- Simple: Making homemade jam is super easy! And you don’t need fancy ingredients or to add store bought pectin. Traditionally, jam is made with regular granulated sugar. This recipes uses brown sugar. Three ingredients – that’s all you need!
- Flavor: Brown sugar and white sugar have different flavors. It is subtle, but brown sugar gives a deep, caramel or toffee-like flavor because of the molasses. You can eat this blueberry preserves straight out of the jar, mop it on a bit of bread, sandwich a dollop in a scone, or mix a lump into your yogurt.
- Storage: You can can your jars for longterm storage, keep a jar in the refrigerator for a month, or even freeze blueberry preserves. Make a large batch and you will always have a jar on hand!
- Seasonal: Brown sugar jams and preserves can use any kind of fruit and not just blueberries. Try it with strawberries, peaches, figs or any other favorite fruits.
Ingredients you need
- Blueberries: Fresh fruit at the peak of its season is always the best choice when jam making. You can make jam with frozen blueberries, but I prefer fresh.
- Sweetener: Granulated sugar is the most common sweetener used to make jam. I used light brown sugar in this recipe. Dark brown sugar has more molasses and moisture and can be used, as well. Honey is another option.
- Lemon juice: Citrus juice naturally contains pectin, which is why it is added to fruit to make jam.
Step-by-step directions
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- Combine the ingredients. In a small pot combine blueberries, brown sugar and lemon juice over medium heat.
- Simmer. Bring mixture to a boil, then reduce to low heat, crushing the blueberries to release the juices. Cook until jam thickens, about 20 minutes.
- Cool. If you are going to store in the refrigerator, cool until room temperature first then transfer to an airtight container. Or, if you are canning your jam, click here for directions on click here for directions on how to can using boiling water.
Recipe tips and FAQs
Not only does brown sugar have more moisture, because of the molasses it is also darker in color. This can affect how some of your jams will turn out. Your strawberry and peach jams might have a darker color than jams made with granulated sugar.
This doesn’t affect blueberry jam made with brown sugar because, well, it’s a dark jam.
You can also make jam with honey. So many sweetener options. Check out my recipe for blueberry jam made with honey here.
Storing Instructions
CANNED: Jams that have been canned using hot water canning, can last in a cool dark pantry for up to a year. As long as the seal is intact and mold is not present, the jam is safe to eat past a year.
REFRIGERATE: You can also store jam in the refrigerator. The USDA says that it will last for 10 days, but I have found that it lasts longer than that. Use your best judgement.
FREEZE: There are freezer safe jam containers that can be used to store your jam in the freezer. Again, the USDA says it will keep in the freezer for up to 3 months but I have found that it does last longer. Again, use your best judgement.
Brown sugar is a mixture of white sugar and molasses. Although technically speaking, brown sugar contains slightly fewer calories than white sugar, the difference is pretty slim. Brown sugar has more moisture than white sugar, which will affect whatever you are cooking or baking. So you see, you can totally make jam with brown sugar.
Jam is basically fruit cooked down with sugar. Traditionally, granulated sugar is used. But you can create a syrupy jam with other sweeteners like brown sugar, agave nectar and yes, even honey.
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Blueberry Preserves with Brown Sugar
Ingredients
- 1 lb blueberries
- ⅓ cup light brown sugar packed
- 2 tablespoon lemon juice
Instructions
- In a small pot combine blueberries, brown sugar and lemon juice over medium heat.
- Bring mixture to a boil, then reduce to low heat, crushing the blueberries to release the juices.
- Cook until jam thickens, about 20 minutes.
- If you are going to store in the refrigerator, cool until room temperature first then transfer to an airtight container. Or, if you are canning your jam, click here for directions on click here for directions on how to can using boiling water.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition Disclaimer
Nutritional information is an estimate provided to you as a courtesy. You should calculate the actual nutritional information with the products and brands you are using with your preferred nutritional calculator.
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Written by Laura Bashar
Hi, I’m Laura, a certified professional cook and cookbook author living in San Diego. I have been sharing my family’s favorite recipes inspired from all over the world since 2008. Let’s cook up something fun!
If I triple the amount of blueberries, should I triple the amount of lemon juice too?
Hi Ashley-
Yes, when you triple the amount of one of the ingredients, you should triple the remaining ingredients as well.
Laura
Okay, thank you for responding!
Could you use frozen – thawed blueberries?
I have used frozen fruit to make jam before. I prefer fresh fruit for jam, but you can use frozen.
I can’t get the canning instructions for blueberry jam with brown sugar to come up. Can you help? Thank you
Oh, sorry about that. I put the link back in. Here it is for you: http://familyspice.com/can-using-boiling-water/
Wow this recipe sounds so delicious! Thank you for sharing 🙂 I was wondering though if it is neccessery to use lemon juice since I’m quite allergic to citruses. Is it possible to make good brown-sugar-blueberry-jam without the lemon?
Hi Russa,
Sorry to hear that you are allergic to citrus. Lemon juice in jam making is important not only for pectin, but especially important for the acid. It prevents bacteria growth when canning. If you’re making a bottle to refrigerate and eat within a week, then you can omit it. But for canning, use malic and tarteric acid, which are substitutes for citric acid.
Thanks! Yes it can restrict eating a bit but you’ll live 🙂 Anyway yeah, I’m not going to can it so i guess it’s not going to be a big problem. And I bet it’s going to disappear from the fridge quite soon haha. I’m trying it with leipäjuusto, Finnish squeaky cheese but made from goat milk. It’s usually eaten with jam but I decided I’d try a (somewhat) healthier version brown sugar jam since the commercial jams here are always made from the white sugar. So thanks for the recipie, I’m going to try it as soon as possible
Wonderful! I hope you like it. And if you prefer making jam with honey, I have that recipe here: http://familyspice.com/paleo-blueberry-jam-made-honey/ Funny that it’s also with blueberries. I definitely have a weakness for them!