July brings handfuls, baskets and baskets of small blue-black berries - delicious and very healthy! Guess? Well, of course, it's blueberries. Sometimes it is confused with blueberries, but if you look closely, you will notice that, firstly, blueberries are a little smaller and rounder, and blueberry berries are larger and more oblong. Secondly, the blueberry is lighter - the color of the berries is blue-blue with white bloom, the flesh is greenish, and the juice is colorless. Blueberries have a brighter taste and shade: the berries are dark blue, almost black (hence the name), with a bluish bloom, and the flesh and juice is a rich purple color. Eat a handful of blueberries - the tongue and teeth will turn lilac, which is especially good for kids! That's great: eating more fresh blueberries in a season is useful for both children and adults.
It is fitting to assign the modest berries the honorary title of “forest sapphires” - so many valuable substances in them! Blueberries contain vitamins A, B and C; trace elements (potassium, zinc, iron, manganese, phosphorus); organic acids and essential oils; pectin and fiber. Antibacterial and anti-inflammatory properties of blueberries help to cope with colds, beneficially affect digestion.
And blueberries are rich in anthocyanins - pigments responsible for the intense color of the berries. They are antioxidants that improve metabolism and memory, strengthen the immune system, the heart and blood vessels, preserve the flexibility of the mind and vigilance of the eyes.
Probably, everyone has heard about the benefits of blueberries for vision - indeed, anthocyanins, accumulating in the retina, improve its supply with useful substances, strengthen the capillaries - as a result, the sensitivity of the retina and visual acuity increase. If you read or write a lot, work at a computer, your work is connected with visual and mental stress - be sure to eat blueberries! But not buckets, of course - everything is good in moderation. In addition, the effect becomes noticeable not immediately, but after a while of regular use. Ideally, you should eat 3 tablespoons of blueberries every day for 1-2 months. Therefore, it is worth to stock up on a useful berry, while the blueberry season lasts. And now you will learn how to prepare for the winter grated blueberries with sugar, or “raw” jam - stored without heat treatment, which allows you to keep the maximum useful properties of fresh blueberries.
- Cooking time: 15 minutes
- Servings: 2, 3 - 2, 4 l
Ingredients for Blueberry Rubbed with Sugar:
- 1 kg of fresh blueberries;
- 2 kg of granulated sugar.
Cooking Blueberries Rubbed With Sugar:
The proportion of berries and sugar 1: 2 is indicated for cold-made jam - without cooking. Sugar is a natural preservative, so blueberries, like black currants, rubbed with large amounts of sugar, can be stored without sterilization and even under plastic lids.
If you still want to boil and roll blueberries - then you can take berries and sugar in a ratio of 1: 1.
Berries are washed in a bowl with water or in a colander under the faucet. Then we dry a little - in the same colander to glass the water, or on a towel. Just remember that blueberry juice is very good in beautiful lilac color! Therefore, you need to take a towel old or dark color. Paper do not advise - can soak up and stick to the berries.
Blueberries can be harvested with sugar in different ways: grind with a spoon, mash with a masher or grind in a food processor. But metal utensils should not be used to avoid oxidation. Therefore, use enamel bowls, a wooden spoon, plastic powder or a plastic nozzle.
Pour the berries into a bowl, add half of the sugar and begin to rub with a spoon. If you pour out all the sugar at once, it will not be very convenient to grind, and moreover, with the gradual addition, it dissolves better.
During careful grinding of the berry, juice is allowed in which sugar dissolves. It is acceptable for some berries to remain whole.
Pour out the rest of the sugar into the ground blueberries and mix. We do not pack the mixture in cans immediately, but leave at room temperature for several hours, as the sugar does not melt immediately, but will dissolve for some time. If you immediately arrange the jam in banks, it may turn out that it will increase in volume and run away. If you are in a hurry, then fill the jars not to the top, but with a margin of about 4/5 of the height.
Having spread out the blueberries wiped with sugar in sterile glass jars, we close them with sterile covers — plastic or threaded.
Store grated blueberries with sugar in a cool place: in the basement or in the refrigerator.
