A couple months ago I made jam for Christmas presents. Two types I made were Cherry – made from dark sweet cherries – and Blueberry Marmalade – blueberries with lemon and orange flesh and finely chopped zest.
So where I got stupid was that I didn’t keep the two jams separate. Now that I’m ready to label them, I can’t tell them apart. With the exception of a couple of jars that have a sliver of citrus peel near the glass, they look to me identical.
I could open the jars, separate by type, and re-can them, but this would likely affect the quality of the jams.
Any other ideas? I’ve been meaning to purchase Photoshop Elements anyway, so if there’s a way that would help I’ll do so now. Is there any other (not really expensive) software that could help? Any special lamp I could easily get?
They are for gifts. I was hoping that I could take a picture of a jam and then use Photoshop Elements or other software to tell a difference in the color my naked eye can’t discern. Or possibly use some kind of light that would accentuate the difference. There’s gotta be some kind of science way to tell them apart, no?
I could open the jars, determine what variety each is, put all of one kind in a pot, bring to boiling, put in clean jars and reprocess to can them again – but I’m pretty sure the quality would suffer.
I have 15 jars I can’t tell the difference, plus 22 jars of other kinds of jam I can tell what they are. I’m giving 11 gifts of 3 jars each.
I’m considering just making 11 jars of some other type, but I hate to have to do it. It’s not like I don’t have other stuff to do this close to Christmas…
Sure, there are devices like colorimeters that could characterize the jam, but that’s a hundreds to thousands dollar purchase that’s unnecessary. Instead you’d want to use a bright light that provides enough broadband light to compare the two types of jam effectively. Fluorescent type bulbs are not ideal, an LED may or may not be useful, if you can find the manufacturer’s published spectral data that’s ideal, look for a plot that is relatively flat against the Y axis.
I don’t have any suggestions for how to tell the jam apart now, but what I would suggest for next time is to use jars that are different from each other. Maybe ball-shaped jars for the cherry and taller, more cylindrical jars for the blueberry. Both jams sound lovely, no matter how they’re housed.
For now, I love @purplehorseshoe’s clever suggestion to just embrace the boo boo and make it part of the fun. Your loving friends and family will get a kick out of learning you’re as human as they are! They will enjoy the jam surprise, too, I’m sure. Is anyone really that picky about which jam goes on their scone/biscuit/pancake/toast? Not me! Homemade jam always rocks!
While I endorse the gambler gift bit you do have one identified. Maybe it upside down to get a thin layer sticking to the bottom glass now on top and see which ones match that thin bit in color?
I would go with the “Surprise Jam” approach. However, I would supply 2 printed labels and guarantee them that I will, at a future Christmas, supply them with the jam that they didn’t get this time.
I pay a ridiculous amount of money every year to have the good folks at Bonne Maman send me an Advent calendar filled with tiny jars of surprise jam. If any of your friends dares to complain about it, send me their jam! I’ll pay packaging and shipping.