Strawberry Jelly

I am so proud! I made my first batch of homemade strawberry jelly from scratch today. This is the start of my canning/jarring preserving ambition. I want to stop throwing away produce because it goes bad. So, we had a huge thing of strawberries that we bought at Albertson's for only $4.99 the other day and there was no way we were going to eat all of them. I hated the idea of wasting and throwing away what just would go bad.

So, this prompted me to start preserving, which I haven't wanted to do for a long time. The process wasn't easy but it wasn't hard either. I had my BFF there to keep me company and help along the way.

I washed and cut the strawberried then hulled (cut out the center white part) them. I used the handy dandy food processor to mash them all up into a nice little liquid. I ended up with 2 1/2 cups of mashed berries.

I then used 3 1/2 cups of sugar, 1/8 cup of lemon juice, tablespoon of butter, and 1/2 a package of powedered pectin.

I put the berrries, sugar, butter, and juice together in a big pot. Put the burner on medium heat and let it heat up slowly.

I prepped the jars as per many directions (a lot can be found on the net so I wont put it up here unless requested).

Then turned up the heat on the berry mixture. Making sure to bring to a rolling boil and to constantly stir to prevent burning.  Once the stirring didn't disrupt the boiling I added the pectin, stirred well and boiled another minute. Then removed from heat.

I poured the mixture into the jars, sealed them and let them lay upside down for about 10 minutes. Eventually the lids popped in and they were sealed. I then let it sit for 24 hours.

Here is a pic of my new creation. Hopefully more delish concoctions to come soon.