Are you aware of all the ones at NCHFP?

Reduced-Sugar Peach-Pineapple Spread
Reduced-Sugar Refrigerated Apple Spread
Reduced-Sugar Refrigerated Grape Spread
Refrigerator Apple Jelly with Liquid Sweetener
Refrigerator Grape Jelly with Liquid Sweetener
Refrigerator Jelly with Splendaî

Then there are the recipes in these lo-sugar discussions here.

And there is always the Pomona pectin which requires no sugar if you wish and the recipes at their website.

Ball's website also has several recipes posted for their Lo-No Sugar Pectin Most are freezer jam recipes since freezing gives the best results with most low sugar foods.

Hope all this helps.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: NCHFP - Low sugar jams and jellies

On Ball's Low=sugar pectin jars, there are recipes on the back of the label. I used their recipes for the low sugar and adjusted the sugar substitute to my liking, as they suggested.

I've also used the Dutch Jell Lite for my low/no sugar recipes.

I had the same issues last year, and discovered that I liked the Pomona's pectin. Their instructions are easy enough that I could just make things up as I go. Also checked out nearly all of the jam cookbooks our library had and just paged through, comparing differences. A lot of the newer cookbooks use lower sugar recipes, since we now have so many options for pectin.

The recipe I settled on for Peach Jam: 3 lbs peaches; 1 bottle Chardonnay, reduced; 1 Tb Chambord; 2 lemons juiced and strained; 1 c honey; 1/4 -1/2 c sugar depending on your peaches--enough to mix the pectin with; 1 Tb Pomona's + calcium water.

A comment/question about the Ball's low-sugar pectin recipes: They give you a chart listing how much fruit puree, pectin, juice, and sugar (or no sugar) to use for a certain quantity (two half-pints). I decided to make a double batch of the low-sugar version.

If you were using no sugar, the amount of fruit puree was 2c. If you were using some sugar ("up to 1/2c") the amount of fruit puree was 1+1/3c.

This seemed low to me but I went along and doubled it to 2+2/3c. Everything else in the recipe was the same.

However, my instincts were right: it definitely wasn't enough for four half-pints. Maybe it was a typo and they meant 1+2/3c puree for two half-pints? Has anyone else had this problem?

Volume conversions are always approx. simply because they cannot account for the different ways people measure nor for the consistency of the chopped, or in this case, pureed fruit. People "chop" differently and puree to different consistencies. So while 1 2/3c may work for you it could results in more than 4 half pints for others.

We have talked here before about how everyone thinks they measure accurately and yet studies show that among a group measuring the same ingredient those measurements can vary by as much as a 1/4 cup or more depending on the ingredient measured. When one doubles or triples recipes the differences in measurements and in amount of results grows even more.

That's why the "Makes" volume should always be viewed as a guideline only, not an absolute. With acidic foods it poses no safety issues but with low-acid ingredients it can become a safety issue.

Dave

The biggest problem that I've discovered is that the lower the sugar the less jars are needed. Making no-sugar costs more to sell than the sugar version, especially if you have to buy the fruit.

Dave - I always wonder why the US uses volume measurements for dry ingredients when there is so much margin for error. Do you think you'd ever go over to weight? Is there any movement in that direction?

I've converted most all of my recipes to using weights of measure . It makes it a whole lot easier when I use frozen fruit or vegetables because of the huge quantity of canned things I make to sell. "One green pepper" can be anything just like "one can tomato paste" is ambiguous, or "buy 3# of peaches, peel, pit, chop" and then doesn't say how many cups you should END up with, e.g., peaches come in so many sizes! Very frustrating unless you make up the new recipe once and weigh everything to note on the recipe which I then put in a computer file (Word doc). Takes time in the beginning but forever more it's infinitely faster and simpler.
Nancy

Dave - I always wonder why the US uses volume measurements for dry ingredients when there is so much margin for error. Do you think you'd ever go over to weight? Is there any movement in that direction?

Habit probably. But hey it's better then "pinch of" and "handful of". :-)

Was talking about that with the grandsons last week and apparently they are learning it the 'new' way in school along with metrics (which they prefer). They were trying to explain it to me. So while Grandpa tends to go Huh?? the younger generations are much more open to making the needed changes it seems.

Every time the issue has come up in the US in the past - from what I read anyway - the baby boomer generation (we AARP members) tend to raise cain.

But yes I do see a very gradual (some would call it sneaky) shifting in labeling and measurement instructions. Government is just waiting for we old stubborn foggies to die off before making it all official and required.

Dave

A new recipe for me, Bread and Butter pickles using splenda. I got it off of the Splenda website. Hubby is diabetic and alot of friends, The brine even tastes good to me.

I'm sitting here laughing about the imperial vs. metric measurements....

Being (almost) one of the AARP generation (will be 50 in a few days and just got that darned card in the mail) I'm "used to" the imperial, but I'm also in school to be a pharmacy tech and we have to learn both! It's been interesting to figure number of doses in a 250mL bottle, then write instructions for a patient that refer to teaspoons.

That doesn't even figure in the apothecary measurements like grains and scruples! :)
Keeps me on my toes.

I agree with Dave that the yields are just a guideline. I use the low-sugar pectin and pomonas. I make sure I have enough fruit to fill the jars I want, sugar is just a bit extra volume. That "extra" usually ends up on my morning toast.

Deanna