Fig jam is one of the easiest jam recipes we have ever come across. We’d never done it before because, quite simply, we never buy figs.

We live in one of those roads where everyone tends to chat over the fences, though, and our neighbours have a fig tree in their garden. At this time of year the fruit is getting to the end of its run and needs taking off the branches, whether it’s ripe or not, so they gave us a bowl full to see if we fancied making some jam.

The recipe we came up with was our own variation on one found in Mrs Beeton‘s jam and preserves book, of which there was only ever a single print run.

Method
Slice your figs into small pieces and weigh them. For every 900g of fig, put 235ml of water, 680g of sugar and the juice of a lemon into a pan, varying it in proportion to the amount of figs; so halve the quantities if you have only half of that amount of fig, or add 50% more if you have 1.35kg of figs, and so on.

Put the lemon, water and sugar in a large pan or jam pan and bring to the boil. Allow it to continue boiling until the sugar has melted, stirring all the time so that it doesn’t stick.

When the sugar has fully dissolved, add your figs, stir them well and allow them to cook. You will need to stir them regularly and keep an eye on them to make sure that they don’t start sticking to the bottom of the pan, where they would burn.

After about an hour it should be close to ready. Test it by dropping some onto a plate you have chilled in the fridge. If it sets like jelly, it is done. If not, allow it to cook a little longer.

By now the jam should be black, rather than the original pinky red it started as.

Carefully spoon into sterilised jars, being careful of the hot sugar content, which can easily burn you. Seal until you are ready to eat the jam. It can be used as soon as it is cold, but may improve if stored for a few weeks first.

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