After seeing the recipe for tomato marmalade I saw began searching the same website for other unique tomato recipes. That is how I came across the recipe for tomato jam.
Since only a few tomatoes were called for I thought it might be easier to skin the tomatoes by hand. I’m not sure it was, but it meant a bit fewer dishes to wash.
After skinning, chopping and cooking the tomatoes broke down pretty well. It reminded me a lot of crushed tomatoes up to this point. After this step, though, it definitely took a different direction.
It is hard to tell from the photos, but lemon juice, grated lemon rind, ground spices and pectin are added to the tomatoes. To me this is what made this recipe easier than the marmalade – ground spices versus whole spices in a bag.
I realized after measuring out the tomatoes and sugar the mixture came to over 50% sugar. Not exactly a food for it you are on a diet or trying to cut out refined sugars.
Bring to a boil and skim off the froth.
The jam was starting to set as I was ladling it into the jars. You can see in the picture below that there are still chunks of tomatoes in the jam. This is what makes it a jam. The clear liquid is a mixture of tomato juice and all the sugar you saw above.
My first batch set really well, which is great because I put those into jelly jars for gifts at Christmas. The second set, in the pint jars, didn’t set. It may have had to do with the size of the jar or with the canner taking longer to come to a boil. I’m not exactly sure. Either way, the jam in the pint jars is for our home use and will taste the same whether it set or not.
This was also a great recipe to use when I had just a few tomatoes sitting around needing something done with them. It took less time than the marmalade, was simpler to put together as it used lemon juice and ground spices rather than slices and a spice bag. In the future I would make this if I had a few tomatoes and limited time. The marmalade is nice if I have more time and am looking to give some gifts.