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Jam and preserves
All Containers›Shop by use case›Jam and preserves›Making a batch›Cooling, and not moving itShop all jams and preserves →
Making a batch

Cooling, and not moving it

By Dwight Davis, Founder

Updated

On this page5
Moving the product too soon is a published cause of a soft set, and so is using it too soon. The gel is still forming after the jar comes out of the canner, which makes cooling a stage of the process rather than the end of it.

What is still happening

A jar out of the canner is not finished. The vacuum is still forming, the set is still developing, and both are vulnerable to being disturbed. Most of what goes wrong in this step is caused by handling rather than by anything upstream.

The pectin network is setting, and it sets undisturbed. A jar carried across a kitchen, stacked, or tilted while that is happening can come out soft when the same batch left alone came out right, which is why two jars from one pan can differ.

The steps

  1. Lift the jars out and stand them upright on a rack or a towel, not touching each other.
  2. Leave them where they are. Do not move, tilt or stack them.
  3. Leave them overnight before judging the set at all.
  4. Check the seals, then remove the bands before storing.

Judging the set too early

A set continues to firm for longer than most people wait, which means a batch judged at twelve hours is often judged on a product that had not finished. Waiting is the cheapest correction available.

Insufficient time before using is on the published list of causes for a soft set, which means a jar that looks soft the next morning is not necessarily a failed batch. The first thing to do about a soft set is to wait, and that is on it never set.

Why the bands come off

Leaving the band on hides a failed seal rather than preventing one, and the whole point of this step is finding the failures before a customer does.

The seal is the vacuum, not the band. A band left on can hold a failed lid in place and hide a jar that did not seal, which is the one thing you want to find now rather than in a customer's cupboard.

References

National Center for Home Food Preservation, University of Georgia. Causes and possible solutions for problems with jellied fruit products. nchfp.uga.edu
United States Department of Agriculture. Complete Guide to Home Canning, Guide 7: Preparing and Canning Jams and Jellies (rev. 07/2015). National Center for Home Food Preservation. nchfp.uga.edu
Written from federal regulation and published extension guidance, not from a laboratory. A standard of identity is a federal floor and your state adds to it. Anything here is a starting point for a conversation with your state department of agriculture, not a determination that you comply.