homemade pear + lemon jam

I really love pear flavoured things, and so this summer I suggested we try and make some pear jam to my mum... she wasn't that keen on the idea. Pears don't have a lot of pectin in them, so they're hard to make jam from - we considered doing a pear and apple jam, but I didn't fancy that as much. 

A quick bit of googling and we came across this recipe from The Cottage Smallholder (really great for their jams/chutney's etc!). They added lemon to solve the pectin issue: I was worried this would distract from the peariness I wanted, or make it bitter.. I was wrong. This jam is so freaking good. It also came out an amazing rosy pink colour. Spread on toast, in the middle of cakes, or hastily piled into slapdash jam-tarts, it's so good. 

I'm not going to repost the recipe here because we followed it pretty strictly - but I thought I'd show off my labour of love as I did most of this one on my own. It did catch a little bit (that black spot in the photo above, argh!) but I'm pretty proud of it.

Are you trying out any jams now we're definitely into the preserving season? Blackberry jelly, anyone?