Blueberry Jam with Vanilla

This blueberry jam recipe is incredibly good, friends. Made with both lemon juice and a touch of balsamic to balance and brighten the mellow berries, it also gets a creamy vanilla flavor from half a vanilla bean or some vanilla extract.

Made in the French style without any pectin, this jam is beautifully spreadable and bursting with blueberry flavor.

You may also want to check out my strawberry balsamic preserves recipe. And for ease of browsing, you can find all my condiment and jam recipes in one place. Let’s jump into it.

Blueberry Jam, At a Glance

✅Skill Level: Beginner
✅Skills: Boiling Fruit and Sugar, Patience
✅Type: French-Style Jam
✅Number of Ingredients: 5
✅Prep Time: 10 minutes
✅Cook Time: 30 minutes
✅Yield: A generous 2 cups

Related Recipes: French-Style Strawberry Preserves, Mixed Berry Jam

Jump Straight to the Recipe

Tasting Notes

In developing this blueberry jam recipe, I knew I wanted to use vanilla bean in it. I also was looking for an acidic element to use in conjunction with lemon juice.

When I read that balsamic vinegar contains the polyphenol vanillin, one of the main flavor compounds of vanilla, I knew I’d found my answer.

The resulting jam is brightly blueberry balanced by a well-rounded acidity and an almost creamy vanilla finish.

If this sounds like a winner to you and you end up making it, please do me a quick favor, if you would.

How to Make French-Style Blueberry Jam

The traditional French style of making jam takes a couple of days, but nothing is difficult. Most of the time is spent doing whatever you want while your berries and sugar hang out in the fridge.

If you’re familiar with the process, feel free to jump straight to the recipe. Otherwise, I’ll go over ingredients, substitutions, and walk you through the procedure, step by step.

Ingredients and Substitutions

• Blueberries: Fresh or frozen will work equally well
• Sugar: Provides sweetness as well as the jammy consistency when cooked
• Lemon juice: Brightens the flavor and lowers the pH of the jam (makes it more acidic). I prefer freshly squeezed lemon juice. You could also substitute lime juice
• Balsamic vinegar: Provides a bit of additional sugar as well as acidity. In addition, balsamic contains vanillin which is also present in blueberries and vanilla. This makes for a really harmonious flavor pairing
• Vanilla bean: I use half a Mexican vanilla bean, split and scraped. You can use whatever vanilla bean you like, and if you don’t have vanilla beans, use a little vanilla extract after the jam comes off the heat

Procedure

As I said, this is a multi-day (but easy) process. If you’re already familiar, just jump down to the recipe.

For those of you who’ve never made a French-style jam before, let me break it down by day:

Day One

1. Place fruit, sugar, lemon juice, and the half vanilla bean (split and scraped) into a large, heavy-bottomed pan.
2. Add the balsamic vinegar.
3. -4. Use a potato masher or similar to mash up the berries somewhat to help release the juices. Cover, and refrigerate until the next day.

Day Two

1. Heat the pan over low heat for about an hour. Then turn the heat up to medium and bring it just to a high simmer.
2. Mash the fruit more thoroughly as it cooks and softens.
3. The mixture will be steaming and little bubbles will gently break the surface in a few places.

Remove from heat, allow to cool for an hour or so, cover, and refrigerate until the next day.

Day Three

If you’ve made the strawberry preserves, you know that the first thing that happens on Day 3 is to strain the fruit out, but since we’ve already mashed out blueberries, it’s much easier to just cook everything together.

Put your pan over medium to medium-high heat and cook, stirring frequently, until the fruit comes up to 223F/106C.

Use tongs to pull out the spent vanilla bean, or if using extract, stir that in off the heat.

Ladle into clean jars and refrigerate for up to 3 months.

If you don’t have a ladle, fill jars with a large spoon or a metal measuring cup. Whether or not you’re quick canning the jam, be sure to wipe the rims to make sure no jam is stuck that might ruin a good seal.

Simplifying the Process

If you are short on time, you can make the jam in one day. Rather than doing each step on a different day, do them all on the same day.

Try to give it at least 4 hours between steps, but even if you just go from one “day” to the next, your jam will still be very tasty.

A good schedule to make the jam all on one day would be Day One at 9am, Day Two at 1pm, and Day Three at 5pm.

Recipe Variations (Make It Fancy)

This jam is already pretty fancy as it is. But I’ll tell you what, if you want to fancy up a jam with some Bourbon, Pook’s Pantry has the blueberry bourbon jam for you.

Hers does contain pectin. So if you prefer a French-style jam, check out the amount of Bourbon she uses and apply it to this recipe.

A Little Blueberry Jam Q & A

Questions?

If you have any questions about this post or recipe, I am happy to help.

Simply leave a comment here and I will get back to you soon. I also invite you to ask question in my Facebook group, Fearless Kitchen Fun.

If your question is more pressing, please feel free to email me. I should be back in touch ASAP, as long as I’m not asleep.

A Note About Measurements

My recipes are almost all written by weight, including liquids, unless otherwise specified.

For accuracy and consistency of results, I encourage you to buy–and use–a kitchen scale.

I promise that baking and cleanup will be so much quicker and easier.

This is the scale that I recommend for home use. I have owned and used one for years.

Love This? Please Take a Moment to Rate and Review

And that’s it for today, y’all.

I really hope you make and love this blueberry jam. It’s great stirred into plain or vanilla yogurt, on toast or a sandwich. I know you’ll find many ways to enjoy it!

Take care.