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Peach Jam Recipe and Canning Instructions

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In this post, I am going to share my peach jam recipe with you! I don’t make my jam the traditional way… I use less sugar and no store-bought pectin. I hope you’ll learn a few tricks here that you’ll try when you make your own homemade peach jam. This is also a peach jam canning recipe, so you can go ahead and make a large batch and can your jam, we will go over all the canning instructions as well. I have the handy peach jam recipe printable for you at the end of the post. Ok, let’s start… Here is how to make peach jam… 

I don’t have my own peach tree… Yet. It’s soooo up there on my list, you guys. I HAVE to have a peach tree or three very soon, but for now, since I’m still not sure that I’m going to stay in this house, I’m not planting one.

Anyway, it doesn’t prevent me from making this delicious peach jam almost every year (or from canning peaches!). I either wait until peaches go on sale at the grocery store during the peak of summer and buy a whole lot of them so I can make a big batch of homemade peach jam for the rest of the year or I drive the hour and fifteen minutes to the state farmer’s market.

Yes, yes. I will drive far for peaches! You see, we have this huge State Farmer’s Market here in NC. In the back, there is a huge building where large farms can sell vegetables and fruit by the crate to restaurants. I sneak in there once a year and pretend to be a known chef.

I fill my car with crates of fruit (I grow my own vegetables so it’s only fruit that I am in need of usually…) and drive home with a smile on my face like I’ve just won the lottery!

When I get home I usually take a few days to just process jam. We eat a lot of jam during the year, and my goal is always to end up with enough jam for the rest of the year. Sometimes it’s this delicious low sugar peach jam, sometimes it’s my strawberry jam, sometimes it’s mulberry jam, sometimes it’s a blueberry jam. We like them all.

Peach Jam Recipe…

Peach jam recipe with less sugar and no store-bought pectin. Let me show you how easy it is to make homemade peach jam and can it! #peachjamrecipe #howtomakepeachjam #lowsugarpeachjamrecipe #peachjamrecipeforcanning

I don’t make my jams the traditional way. Personally, I feel like a 1:1 ratio of sugar and fruit is just too much sugar for me. It’s too sweet and I can’t taste the fruit. So I cut back on the sugar by 50%. I’ve made my jam like this for years and not only that, in my opinion, it’s much tastier. I also have never had a problem canning my jams and keeping them for the rest of the year.

I also don’t add store-bought pectin. I don’t have a specific problem with it… I just actually have never used it and I honestly don’t even know what is in the little container and where that pectin comes from.

But there is no need to spend time investigating. I simply use lemon seeds which have natural pectin in them. I use a ton of lemons because I season my salads with olive oil, lemon, and salt, so there are always more than enough lemon seeds in my kitchen!

How to Make Peach Jam…

Fresh Peaches

I measured the amount of fruit and sugar that I used so I can share measurements with you but it may be hard for you to follow this recipe and make it with exactly the same measurements, so just pay attention to the process and ratios and follow the ratios and cooking process.

Jams are pretty forgiving. If you add a little bit more or a little bit less sugar nothing bad is going to happen. If you cook your homemade peach jam five minutes longer, it will be fine. Just follow the jam making principals and have fun in the kitchen.

Ok, I started with 9 pounds of peaches. After washing them, cutting them into chunks, and getting rid of the pits, I was left with 4.7 pounds.

Peaches cut and ready for jam.Mmmm… Now that I’m thinking about it, it might have been a little less than 4.7 lb… It’s advised to make this jam during nap time or late at night when the thieves are asleep 😉

Another note here… You probably noticed that I didn’t remove the skin of my fruit. I have no problem with the skin, I actually like it in my jam. You’ll see soon that we mash the whole thing with a stick blender so at the end of the process I can barely find a piece of skin in the jam so I don’t see a reason to spend time removing it.

It’s up to you, though. If you’d like, go ahead and remove the skin or your peaches. You will have to blanch them in boiling water for 45 seconds, then let them cool in ice cold water for a couple of minutes before removing the skin.

Peaches with sugar. I add the fruit to a large, shallow pot and add sugar. This is the rule I follow for all of my jams unless they are sugar-free… I add half of the weight of the fruit in sugar. So if you are cooking 3 pounds of fruit, add 1.5 pounds of sugar.

It is still plenty of sugar… Add this amount of sugar to a ripe fruit that is already plenty sweet and it’s more than enough sweetness in my opinion. It is also enough sugar to preserve the jam and keep it for months. Again, I usually make a yearly supply of jam and have never had any of my jam go bad (as long as the jars are sealed correctly).

I have to admit that in many cases I even round down… So, in this case, I added 2 pounds of sugar even though I had a little over 4.5 pounds of fruit but the general rule I follow is a ratio of 1 part fruit to 1/2 part sugar.

Peach jam recipe boiling.Once I add the sugar, I turn the heat to medium-high and let the fruit/sugar mixture come to a boil while I stir frequently.

I let it boil for about 8 minutes, then lower the heat to medium.

Mushing peach jam recipe.I let the fruit cook for a few more minutes on medium heat and once the peaches are soft, I put my hand blender to work.

Stick blender in peach jam.You can mash your peach jam completely or just a little depending on how you like it. I sometimes leave chunks of fruit and sometimes I mash everything all the way. With this jam, I gave it a good blend and didn’t leave any big chunks.

Removing foam from peach jam. At this point, we are about 25 minutes in. I make sure to keep stirring frequently and I fish some of the foam that accumulates on the edges of the pot out. I don’t go crazy trying to remove all of it… Whatever I can remove easily I remove.

Lemon seeds in peach jam.

After about 35 minutes of cooking, I add the juice of half a lemon to the jam and stir.

Then, to start the thickening process, instead of using store-bought pectin I add the seeds of that same half lemon I used. Lemon seeds have pectin in them. When you throw them in the jam and let them cook they release this pectin and thicken your jam.

Like I said in the beginning, I am not sure what’s in the store-bought pectin, but this is a natural way to thicken jams and you can do this in any jam you make.

You can also dry the lemon seeds during the year by simply placing them on a paper towel and letting them dry for a few days. Then store them in a jar and keep them for when you make jam. Add 5 to 10 seeds to the jam.

I usually just throw them in and fish them out later before I can my peach jam (or any other jam).

Jars for canning peach jam.While the jam is cooking with the lemon seeds prepare your jars for canning.

You can do this by boiling them in water for a few minutes or you can do this in the oven.

I find the oven method much easier and much less messy. Simply heat your oven to 320F, place the jars on a baking sheet and stick in the oven for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, place the lids and rings in a small pot, fill it with water to cover the lids and rings and bring it to a boil. Let this boil for around five minutes or so before you turn off the heat.

Always make sure to use new lids. This way you know for sure that the seal is good and new, but you can definitely reuse rings.

**Note – this is also a good time to fill your big water bath canner with water and start heating the water. You want to keep the water simmering until we are ready to process the jars in the water bath. Make sure you fill it with enough water to cover your jars by an inch.

After ten minutes, take the baking sheet with the jars out of the oven and set on the counter. make sure you do not touch the mouth of the jars.

Peach jam recipe.50 minutes in, and it looks like the jam is ready. It’s a bit tricky to learn how to recognize this stage. If you over-cook or under-cook a few jams, it’s totally normal.

Peach jam spoon test.After making a few jams, you’ll be able to recognize this stage easily but at the beginning, you can do a spoon test. Just spoon a tablespoon of jam and let it cool for a couple of minutes. Then, I let it drop to a plate and watch the thickness. Take into consideration that the jam will thicken even a little more as it cools completely.

Canning Peach Jam…

Filling jars with peach jam for canning.Now it’s time to fill the jars with the jam. I use a canning funnel, bring the pot of jam close to the jars and spoon the jam into the jars…

Filling jars with peach jam.Leaving 1/4 inch of headspace. This is important, too much or too little headspace, and your jars won’t seal.

Next, remove air bubbles with the bubble remover, clean the rim of the jar with a clean paper towel making sure not to touch it with your fingers. Use your lid lifter to grab a lid from the pot of hot water and place the lid on the jar. Grab a ring and screw it on the jar finger tight (or in other words, not tight).

The last step is to process these jars in a water bath. Use your jar lifter to grab the jars and set them on the water bath rack, make sure they don’t touch each other. Lower the rack to the hot simmering water in the water bath, make sure the water cover the jars by an inch. Cover the pot, bring the water to a boil and process half pint jars for 10 minutes.

Don’t forget that processing time depends on your altitude so if you live above 1000 feet in altitude, make sure to check this post for information on how to adjust processing time.

For this amount of fruit, I ended up with seven half-pint jars.

**If you want to see how the whole water bath processing works, I show it in a step by step picture tutorial in my post How to Can Tomato Sauce.

Canning peach jam

After 10 minutes of processing, use your jar lifters to remove the jars from the water bath and set them on the counter. Let them cool completely undisturbed for at least 12 hours.

After 12 hours, check that all of your jars sealed by pressing your finger in the middle of the lid. If the jar has sealed there will not be any movement in the lid. If you find a jar that didn’t seal you can remove the lid, clean the rim and use a new lid, cover the jar again and process it again. Or you can simply place it in the fridge and use that one first.

It will keep in the fridge until you are 90 years old but I am sure you’ll use it before then.

To store your jars, remove the rings and place the jars in the pantry. They should be good for the next year.

Peach jam in a spoon

This is it for this low sugar peach jam recipe! On to the next fruit and the next batch of jam.

You can take this method and use it to make any jam you want! Use this same ratio and the same process just use a different fruit. Here is how I make mulberry jam pretty much the same way, and here is a recipe for low sugar strawberry jam and for cantaloupe jam, sugar-free strawberry jam and chia blueberry jam… You might also like my candid oranges that are a bit different from a jam but are seriously to die for!

And let’s not forget the mango jam!

If you want to check out another way of making peach jam that includes blanching the fruit to remove the skin, check out this post from A Sweet Pea Chef.

Here is the handy printable…

Continue to Content
Peach Jam Recipe

Peach Jam Recipe

Yield: 7 half-pint jars
Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 50 minutes
Additional Time: 30 minutes
Total Time: 1 hour 40 minutes

Simple and delicious peach jam recipe with less sugar.

Ingredients

  • 4.5 lb peaches, pit removed and cut into small pieces
  • 2 lb sugar
  • Juice of 1/2 lemon
  • 5-10 lemon seeds

Instructions

  1. Add peaches and sugar into a large, sallow pot and bring to a boil on medium high heat, stirring frequently.
  2. Let the mixture boil for 8 minutes.
  3. Lower the heat to medium and keep cooking while stirring frequently for a few more minutes.
  4. When the fruit is soft, mash it with a stick blender to your desired texture.
  5. Keep cooking on medium heat, stirring frequently and removing the foam that accumulates on the edges of the pot.
  6. After about 35 minutes of cooking add the lemon juice and lemon seeds. Cook for an additional 20 minutes, stirring frequently, until the jam is thick then remove from heat.

Notes

To Can Your Jam You Will Need...

7 half-pint jars with new lids and rings

Water bath canner

Canning utensils

Paper towel

  1. Fill your water bath canner with enough water to cover your jars by an inch. Set on the stove top and bring water to a boil.
  2. Sterilize your jars by placing them on a baking sheet and heating them for 10 minutes in a 320 F pre-heated oven or by processing them in boiling water for 10 minutes.
  3. Add your lids and rings to a small pot, cover with water, bring to a boil and let boil for 5 minutes.
  4. Fill your jars with the hot jam, making sure not to touch the rim of the jar as you fill it.
  5. Use a clean paper towel to wipe the rim of the jar.
  6. Use your lid lifter to lift a lid from the hot water and place it on the jar. Then screw on the ring to finger tight.
  7. Use your jar lifters to lift the jars onto the water bath canner rack. Lower the rack to the hot water. Make sure the water covers your jars by about an inch.
  8. Cover the canner, bring water back to a boil and process for 10 minutes (if you live in altitude of above 1000 feet adjust accordingly)
  9. Use your jar lifters to remove the jars from the canner, set the jars on the kitchen counter to cool completely for about 12 hours.
  10. Check that your jars sealed. Remove the rings and store in the pantry.

Nutrition Information:
Yield: 7 Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 670Total Fat: 1gSaturated Fat: 0gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 1gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 24mgCarbohydrates: 174gFiber: 8gSugar: 161gProtein: 4g

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© Lee
Cuisine: American / Category: Preserving

Posted on June 1, 2019 · Last updated June 18, 2020 · Water Bath Canning

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  1. Sheri says

    June 14, 2015 at 5:29 pm

    Next time toss in some pre-soaked & strained Tapioca. I soak about a cup per batch.

    Reply
    • Lee says

      June 14, 2015 at 10:07 pm

      Does it change the flavor much Sheri?

      Reply
      • Sheri says

        June 15, 2015 at 12:03 am

        No change in flavor at all! Little story: Years ago I met a very old woman from war torn Europe. During the war years it was hard to make jam & jelly and the ladies discovered using Tapioca brought wonderful results to their jam. The first time I tasted this done was Adelle’s Apricot Tapioca jam. It’s just wonderful! Also what I discovered was that if you put your fruits through a juicer and put the juice back with the fruit body pulp it doesn’t require any pectin. Pectin is actually “fruit fats” so by pulverization it releases the fats to heat and re-bond. Do realize that some fruits don’t have as much fruit fats as others so when I make eggless lemon curd I use my tapioca as a thickener. Yum!

        Reply
        • Lee says

          June 15, 2015 at 7:37 pm

          Sounds good. If to be honest, I don’t think I ever ate tapioca. I’ll have to try this. Thanks.

          Reply
  2. chris aka monkey says

    June 14, 2015 at 6:53 pm

    this is the easiest way i have seen to make jam …. i pinned it and i am going to try it thanks xx

    Reply
    • Lee says

      June 14, 2015 at 10:06 pm

      I am all about easy Chris! Thanks for pinning.

      Reply
  3. Jenny D says

    June 15, 2015 at 9:41 am

    Oh wow that oven tip is awesome – thanks for sharing! I will definitely be trying that next time I can. No peaches this year sadly but hopefully lots I berries 🙂

    Reply
  4. Bev K says

    July 25, 2015 at 3:40 pm

    Do you not peel the peaches? The ones you have chopped up in the bowl look more like nectarines than peaches. I’m not sure I’d want that fuzzy peel in my jam. Otherwise I love the method and may try it this year.

    Reply
    • Lee says

      July 25, 2015 at 4:21 pm

      Yes, some of them were nectarines, but I do the same thing for peaches. I don’t peel because I don’t mind the peel in my jam and it is much less work to just leave it on, but you can peel the peaches if you want. Doesn’t change a thing.
      Thanks for visiting!

      Reply
  5. karen says

    August 25, 2015 at 1:18 pm

    I made 1/2 of this recipe on August 25, 2015. I was easy to cut up peaches and I added even less sugar since hubby is diabetic…..it is DELICIOUS! I am so glad I tried jam with the skins on, and the lemon seeds worked wonderfully. Thank U.

    Reply
    • Lee says

      August 25, 2015 at 2:42 pm

      Awesome! So happy to hear that you liked it. You can try different ratios of fruit and sugar. I never do the same thing twice. Sometimes I have fruit that I see is going to go bad so I make jam from it, even if it’s just a little bit to keep in the refrigerator. If your husband is diabetic you can even try to make this without sugar at all. Maybe add half a cup of honey or so.

      Reply
  6. Margaret Carraway says

    September 6, 2015 at 1:31 am

    Have you ever canned black berry jelly like this? I can’t wait to try the lemon seeds! Pectin has become so expensive.

    Reply
    • Lee says

      September 6, 2015 at 9:31 pm

      Margaret, I make all my jellies this way. Strawberry, cranberry, peach, blueberry… I never made a blackberry jam before but I don’t see why it won’t work. Thanks for visiting!

      Reply
  7. Chris says

    December 4, 2015 at 1:52 pm

    I didn’t know this about lemon seeds. Do they have to be fresh? Or can you save them up and dry them?
    Thanks for sharing this.

    Reply
    • Lee says

      December 4, 2015 at 8:28 pm

      I never tried it because I always have so many lemons around, but I don’t see why it won’t work. You can try to dry a few, then drop them in a cup of water for a few minutes. Fish them out and see if the outside of the seeds feels like it’s covered in jelly. If it is, it will work just fine in the jam.

      Reply
  8. D. NORDSTROM says

    March 23, 2016 at 2:04 pm

    Women are so smart! thanks to our host and all of those phenomenal replies, I learned a lot and I’ve been a professional chef for over 25 years!!!! I knew about the oven processing, and most of the other tips, but not about the tapioca, or lemon seeds for thickening! very cool, can’t wait to try it.
    May I offer another way to quick “can” something intended for refrigeration, perhaps for a bit longer than refrigerator storage? It’s the way Italians do it: process the jars as above, add the hot fruit jam, put the lids on as you described, then after sealing, turn over the jars onto a clean towel surface. That, too creates that “pop” which tells you it’s sealed, but I put these into the fridge for long term storage. Keep all those tips coming, ladies, it was great..

    Reply
    • Lee says

      March 23, 2016 at 3:24 pm

      Thanks for the tip! I’ll try it next time.

      Reply
  9. Mushtak says

    December 26, 2016 at 12:08 am

    Hi Lee

    I am staying in Dar Es Salaam and we have many problems to bring in seeds or plants from outside our country.

    I am interested to out dwarf fruit plants in my farms. Can u explain me how I can do it using our fruit trees locally .

    Will appreciate your earliest reply .

    By the way I really liked the explanation on the ham. May b I should do a test on mango and pine apples jams now that the season is on .

    Reply
  10. Candy Goodreau says

    May 30, 2017 at 11:03 am

    Will this work for grape jelly. BTW thank you for the new way to go natural. I made your strawberry and chia jam earlier.

    Reply
    • Lee says

      May 31, 2017 at 6:09 am

      Should work for any jam or jelly!

      Reply
  11. Robyn says

    April 6, 2019 at 10:03 pm

    Thanks for the recipe. I used Blackboy Peaches and looks good. Apple cores can be used as pectin too.

    Reply
    • Lee says

      April 7, 2019 at 9:23 am

      Robyn, apple cores with the seeds? Or seeds removed?

      Reply
  12. Michelle Stanley says

    May 26, 2019 at 1:30 pm

    Do you use the pint size jars, if so how many jars do I need for the 9 pounds of jam?

    Reply
    • Lee says

      May 28, 2019 at 2:11 pm

      I used the half pint size and I think that I filled about 7 of them. It has been a couple of years so I can’t remember for sure…

      Reply
  13. Jennifer says

    July 19, 2019 at 11:42 pm

    This is a great recipe. I made it tonight and the lemon seeds worked great! Thank you!!!

    Reply
    • Lee says

      July 20, 2019 at 6:11 am

      Wonderful! I’m so happy you liked it.

      Reply

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Hi! I’m Lee Traister, a.k.a Lady Lee. I help homesteaders simplify their homesteading journey while still producing a ton of food! I am a single mother of four, I was born in Israel and raised in an agricultural commune called a Kibbutz. Now I homestead in central NC.

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