In the last article, I shared some great reasons to include Red, Purple and Blue foods into your day. Suffice it to say that there are many cancer fighting nutrients that are found in these foods. One of my favorites on the list, and one that has received a lot of attention in the last few years is BLUEBERRIES!
If you want to know more specifically about blueberries, I wrote two articles about blueberries, much of the information came from the American Institute for Cancer Research, which lists blueberries as one of their “Foods that Fight Cancer”.
Blueberries: Tips and Recipes
Make Your Own Whole Fruit Preserves
If you’re anything like me, you don’t know what the difference is between jelly, jam, and preserves. So I’m going to make it simple. Hopefully you real foodies aren’t insulted. Basically, jelly is just the juice part of the fruit with a gel and sugar. Jam has some fruit in it and has a lot of sugar and gel. Preserves are actually most of the fruit, again with sugar and gel.
Making my own version of preserves is actually one of my favorite ways to add more fruits in my breakfast. I like to make a large batch that will last for a week or so. The preserves are great to add some flavor to any of the following:
- pancakes
- waffles
- french toast
- oatmeal
- yogurt
- toast
- peanut butter sandwiches
- ice cream
Two-Ingredient Preserves Recipe
Part of the reason I love making these is that it’s so simple! In fact, if I’m having pancakes, I start the preserves, then mix and cook the pancakes and it’s done about the same time. Depending on how much you make, it can take from 30-40 minutes.
The amounts of each depend on your taste and how much you want to make. Remember, you can always add more sugar, but it’s hard to take it away once you put it in! I used about 3 Tbsp with this large bowl of frozen berries. The berries filled about 3/4 of the pan when I started. Of course, they shrunk down to about 1/4 of the pan by the end!
PrintTwo-Ingredient Preserves: Make Your Own Blueberry Jam
Ingredients
- Frozen blueberries (or other frozen berries or cherries)
- Sugar (I use regular white sugar, but use can use whatever verison you prefer)
Instructions
- Place the berries in a pot on medium high and add the sugar (use a conservative amount).
- Allow the berries to simmer for as long as it takes to cook most of the liquid out.
- Place into a serving dish and serve hot over your breakfast of choice!
- Leftovers can be stored in the fridge and are great in place of jelly and to make your own “fruit on the bottom yogurt”, just put some of the preserves in your plain yogurt!
Here’s what it looked like for me:
BEFORE:
DURING:
AFTER:
Ta Da!!I promise, it is quite easy. And if you don’t think it’s sweet enough, you can always add a bit of maple syrup when you serve it. Now that you’ve got the preserves, you are probably wanting to know some good pancake recipes, right? I’ve got you covered:
Here’s another article on making berry compote, below it is a pancake recipe from my co-worker, Lindy. It’s really yummy!
I’d love to see how yours turns out. Share it with me on the my facebook page! Or on Instagram, I’m a newbie on there. 🙂
– Julie
