Winner of $60 giveaway and Strawberry + Blueberry Preserve / Jam

First of all thanks to all the readers who took time out to browse thru my recipes and left the comment on the previous post, really meant a lot to me. Now, for the winner as you all know there can be only one so I took help of my daughter to pick one. Yes, I'm little old fashioned still have not figured out(read it as lazy also) how to use Random.org so wrote all the names on piece of paper, folded each piece of paper, mixed together in a bowl, picked one and Congrats to Eve for winning $60 gift certificate from CSN. I'll send you an email with all the details, enjoy your win and Thanks to CSN for giving me the opportunity to host this giveaway.

Now for today's recipe here's a simple Strawberry and Blueberry Preserve/Jam.

Simple ingredients no fancy stuff, I'm making this from almost last 5 yrs. One of his Aunt when she visited us from dehradun-India(hub for strawberry cultivation in India) gave me this simple recipe, since then I usually make it every other week in strawberry season. My husband doesn't like store bought Jams/Preserve but this is one home-made preserve he eats with everything. I even freeze it for couple of months(I don't do canning) when I get big supply of strawberries, just thaw it in the fridge before use(see notes). I prefer to keep it in the fridge and it goes well with pancakes, as a spread on toasted bread, on top of ice cream or simply spoonful from jar to mouth. Now for the recipe :

What U need :

• 
  
  1 pound of fresh strawberries
• 
  
  1/2 cup fresh blueberries
• 
  
  3/4 to 1 cup white sugar (depending upon the sweetness of berries)
• 
  
  juice of half a lemon

What U do :

1. 
   
   Wash all the berries. Hull the strawberries & roughly chop the strawberries.
2. 
   
   In a heavy bottom steel pan(non-reactive) put all the berries and mix sugar in it. Let it sit for 3-4 hours.
3. 
   
   On a medium heat bring the berry mixture to a boil add lemon juice & let everything cook together till it becomes thick & glossy, keep stirring in between.
4. 
   
   Once the fruit is cooked & all soft you can mash it with the back side of your spoon, that way it's still chunky but don't have too big pieces of fruit. It might take around 20-30 minute or so to cook the whole thing depending upon how juicy the fruit is. Once cool transfer it to sterilized jar. 

Note : You can easily leave the blueberries out for only strawberry version. Also this is not very sweet, it's more of sweet & tangy in taste but if U like more sweeter version U can simply increase the quantity of sugar. For freezing I usually portion it into roughly 2 week supply & fill it into glass bottles and don't fill to the brim, because when it freeze it expands so need extra space otherwise the bottle will crack. I usually fill 3/4 of the bottle.

As I'm writing this post, in my mind I'm planning to make a fresh batch of this preserve in the morning as the one made last week is already finished, little one enjoyed licking it from the plate. So go ahead and try it at least once before the strawberry season slips away.