Cooking delicious and healthy carrot jam
Carrots are one of the most affordable and healthy vegetables loved by everyone since childhood. It grows well even in harsh Siberian conditions. From this vegetable you can cook a lot of different tasty and nutritious dishes and even jam. The correct way to prepare such a delicacy will allow you to save all the beneficial properties of carrots and diversify your daily diet.
The benefits and harms of carrots
It's no secret that carrots are the king of vegetables in terms of vitamin A content. Therefore, regular consumption of such a vegetable helps to significantly improve vision. Carrots contain a lot of fiber, useful for the normal functioning of the stomach. Carrots are also an excellent source of vitamins and minerals that help strengthen the body's immune system, as well as get rid of waste and toxins. The vegetable is useful for women during pregnancy and during breastfeeding.
Harm from carrots can only be when there is an allergy to it or if the vegetable is consumed excessively.
Proven Recipes
There are a large number of old and new carrot jam recipes. Presented for you are both classic options for preparing this dessert, as well as very unusual ones.
Traditional
If you have never tried carrot jam, then you should start your acquaintance with this dish with this recipe. For him, you need to prepare a kilogram of ripe carrots, 1.2 kg of sugar, a couple of sachets of vanillin and one and a half glasses of water. In some cases, to give the jam a more interesting taste, add a little acid or lemon juice.
Cooking process: the first step is to mix granulated sugar and water in a metal bowl, put it on fire and hold until the syrup starts to boil. After that, do not remove the mass from the stove for about 5 minutes. While the syrup is being prepared, you can do the vegetables. Young ripe carrots should be washed well, peeled, if necessary, and cut into thin slices or slices. Add the chopped vegetables to the sugar syrup and cook them together for no more than 10 minutes. Then remove the container from the stove, cool and infuse for about 9 hours, maybe even a little longer.
This is not the end of the cooking process. After the carrots have been infused in the syrup, put it on fire again, add granulated sugar and cook the mass until it becomes thick and the vegetable acquires a translucent hue. At the end of the process, pour vanillin into the jam and, if desired, lemon acid. The resulting composition can be poured into prepared jars and left to be stored for the winter.
With orange and spices
There is no doubt that such a tasty, fragrant and healthy jam will appeal to everyone without exception. Even skeptics who believe that a vegetable cannot make a good dessert. Here is a list of required products:
- 1 lemon
- 2 oranges
- grated ginger - 80 grams,
- carrots - 0.5 kg,
- sugar sand - 0.5 kg,
- a little cinnamon.
First, peel all fruits, vegetables and ginger from the skin. Puree the carrots with a food processor or grate them on a fine grater. The same procedure must be done with citrus peel and ginger. Cut orange and lemon pulp into small cubes.Now place the chopped fruits and vegetables in a saucepan, put it on the stove with minimum power and simmer the future delicacy to a boil.
All this time, it is important not to forget to stir the jam in order to prevent it from burning. As soon as the mass begins to boil, detect 40 minutes and cook it during this time. Then add a little ground cinnamon to the jam, mix everything well and simmer for another 10 minutes.
The resulting delicacy can be immediately poured into jars and closed with lids. Or refrigerate and serve if desired.
Jam
Unlike jam, jam is thicker and more uniform. That is, it should not contain individual pieces of vegetables or fruits. Making carrot jam according to the classic recipe is quite simple. To do this, you need to take 1 kg of fresh vegetables and granulated sugar, as well as a little lemon acid and 300 ml of water. Peel the vegetables, cut into thin round slices, dip them in hot water to become a little softer. Then you need to chop the carrots in a blender, food processor or pass through a meat grinder. If the vegetables turned out to be very soft, then you can make mashed potatoes even with a regular fork.
Now you need to prepare a syrup from sugar and water, then add the carrot mass to it. Simmer over a fire until fully cooked and pour a little lemon acid into the jam. Jam is ready! If desired, you can diversify the dessert by adding grated lemon or orange zest, a little cinnamon or vanilla.
with an apple
Carrots and apples go great together. Therefore, you can use a fairly simple but good jam recipe with these ingredients. About 300 grams of ripe apples should be washed, pitted and stalk removed, but not peeled.Red apples work best for this recipe. Cut them into small cubes and mix together with the same amount of grated fresh carrots. Then pour about 400 grams of sugar into the resulting mass and mix everything well again until a homogeneous mass. Put the pan with the workpiece on the stove and simmer for about 3 hours until the sugar is completely dissolved.
In your free time, you can enjoy lemonade. It must be ground in a food processor along with the peel. When apples with carrots and sugar are cooked, mix them with lemon gruel. Mix again until smooth and put on fire. Keep the dishes on the stove until the first bubbles appear, and then simmer for about an hour. After that, carrot-apple jam is completely ready. It can be poured into jars and stored in the cellar for the winter, or simply spread out in plastic containers and put in the refrigerator.
With calendula
If you haven't tried Carrot Jam with Calendula yet, you should definitely do it! This delicacy has a lot of useful properties, while it also looks very beautiful. Therefore, it can even be made for sale or presented as a gift to loved ones. You need to prepare 2 medium-sized lemons with a thin skin, about 12 calendula flowers, 1 kg of vegetables and granulated sugar, half a liter of water. Peeled and washed carrots must be chopped in any way. You can even cut it figuratively, so the dessert will turn out even more refined. Add the vegetable to a pot of water, put on the stove and bring to a boil. Then cook for about 3 more minutes.
At this time, grind the lemons together with the zest and mix them with the flowers in a separate bowl. Boil the resulting mixture for about 5 minutes until boiling, then combine the carrots, sugar and citrus fruits.Cook the contents over low heat until the jam thickens.
Pour the dessert into jars directly hot, without waiting for it to cool. You can store such jam for several months, it will not lose its taste and useful properties.
Helpful Hints
It is important to know the following.
- In order for carrot jam to acquire a bright and beautiful color, choose exclusively ripe fruits of sweet varieties for its preparation, then you will get not only a rich shade of dessert, but also a great taste.
- Always wash and clean vegetables thoroughly before cooking. This will achieve the most delicate and pleasant taste, without bitterness.
- If you want to keep the maximum amount of useful vitamins in carrot jam, do not cook vegetables for too long. To do this, simply cut the carrots as small as possible, then the heat treatment will be minimal.
- Don't be afraid to experiment. Add any berries, vegetables, fruits, or even herbs to carrots. Then you can create a unique delicacy that will delight family and guests.
- You can replace white sugar with honey, stevia, cane brown sugar, or fructose in any recipe. So carrot jam will turn out to be even more useful, and its calorie content will significantly decrease.
Carrot jam and jam will be a great addition to pastries, ice cream, cottage cheese and any other desserts. You can also prepare refreshing fruit drinks, cocktails and smoothies from it. This is a good alternative to store bought sweets. In addition, carrot jam has not only an excellent taste, but also a beautiful color. So, it will become a real decoration of any dish.
In the next video, you will find a recipe for fragrant and healthy carrot, orange and lemon jam.