Plum Jam with Chocolate

5 from 10 votes

This Plum Jam with Chocolate is easy to make, vegan, gluten and nut-free. Perfect to spread on toast, pancakes or enjoy with porridge! Try adding it to muffins or use as cake filling too!

Course Jams, Preserves, Spreads

Cuisine British, Polish

Keyword chocolate, plum jam

Prep Time 10

Cook Time 50

Total Time 1

Servings jars

Calories 335kcal

Author Jo Allison

Ingredients

1 kg plums (Victoria & Common Purple Plum are recommended) washed and stones removed & cut into small chunks
100-120 g granulated sugar* (or more) see notes below
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
60 g cacao or cocoa* see notes below

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

Cut your plums in half and remove the stones. Chop plum halves into chunks and put them in a large, heavy-bottomed pan and add a splash of water. Preserving pan would be perfect here but any pan will do (I used my large cast iron casserole pan and it worked a treat).
Let them simmer on a low heat for approx. 10 minutes until they release their juices and start to break down a bit.
Add sugar, vanilla extract and cacao/cocoa and mix well. Let the mixture simmer for approx 5 minutes but keep an eye on it and don't let it catch at the bottom.
Take the pan off the heat and onto a sturdy surface (I used my wooden chopping board) and using an immersion/stick blender puree the plum mixture until smooth.
Put it back on low heat and simmer until it reaches desired consistency (for me it took 30 min). Make sure you keep checking on your mixture and giving it a stir every now and then. To check whether your plum jam is ready you can do "cold plate test" for which you'll need small plate/saucer that has been chilled in them freezer. When you see that your jam reduced and thickened simply put a small amount onto the very cold plate straight out of the freezer and put it in the fridge for a couple of minutes. If jam thickens even more once cooled and as you push it with your finger it doesn't spread back that means it's ready. If you'd prefer thicker consistency let it bubble away for few more minutes. This particular plum jam is much more forgiving than other jams and conserves and you can really rely on your own instinct here plus bare in mind that it will thicken some more as it cools.
Once ready pour your jam (still hot) into freshly sterilised jars and pop on the lids. Label once jars are completely cooled otherwise your labels will peel off. Store in cool cupboard, away from the heat for a few months and once opened keep in the fridge.

Notes

Nutritional information is approximate and per jar based on 3 equal size jars and meant as a guideline only.
I've made couple of batches of this spread using Victoria Plums for my first batch and Common Purple Plums for my second. Both types of plums work really well with this recipe but if I was to choose one, I would say go for purple plums.
If you are making a batch using 1 k (2.2 lb) of plums starts with 100-120g (½ - ⅔ cup) of sugar. You can always add some more as you taste depending on your preferences but you cannot take it away!
I used cacao instead of cocoa in this recipe which in very simple terms is raw, unprocessed, additive free and full of goodness and it can be used interchangeably with cocoa (processed version) depending on what you have available and/or what's your preference.

Nutrition