Grapes~ Making Juice and Jam Without any Waste

I have a juicer that is underutilized in our house.  Mainly because of the clean up.  Although it can be put into the dishwasher, the machine does require some scrubbing beforehand.  It's often easier to wash it by hand.  Washing by hand is probably better for the cutting blade as well. 

The juicer makes great juice.  My son really likes fresh grape juice.  With this in mind, I decided to preserve some grape juice and make jam at the same time.  When you juice fruits and vegetables there is pulp discarded.  This pulp can be used in making things such as cookies, muffins, soups, and salsa, to name a few suggestions listed in the manual.  I have generally given the pulp to the chickens.  In the past I have juiced a combination of fruits and vegetables and didn't think the combination would taste well in any recipe.  Therefore, the chickens enjoyed the added vitamins it provides. 

I had bought grapes on sale and was wanting to preserve some of the juice.  As I was cleaning out the pulp I was thinking there had to be a use for this... and it hit me.  Why not make it into grape jam!  So that's what I did.  This is now the second batch I have made.  Grapes were on sale again, so why not make more!

When juicing grapes I choose seedless red grapes so there aren't any seeds in the pulp.  The pulp I then turned into grape jam.  In doing this there was no waste to discard. 

Juicing the grapes

After I finished juicing the grapes I strained the juice through a metal strainer, placed in jars, and processed for 20 minutes in a hot water bath. 

This is the pulp along with some juice.

I heated the pulp and processed according to the directions on the Ball low sugar pectin package. 

 I ended up with 4 cups of pulp for the jam.  I added a slight amount of juice according to the directions, sugar, and pectin.  Bottled and processed for 10 minutes, shutting off the burner and letting the jars sit in the water bath another 5 minutes before removing to cool.

Grape Jam

Grape Juice