You might be able to make a batch the old fashioned way. Before we had those awesome packets of pectin, jammers had to reduce the contents of the pot. Here's a recipe I developed for SavorNC magazine that uses this technique. (I'm in central NC. :) ) Take a look. See if you can use it for timings and temps. Can't hurt to try at this point. Would be a shame to toss those lovely berries. Good luck! Erin Strawberry, Ginger, Tarragon Jam February 13, 2011 2 lbs fresh strawberries, hulled 3 cups sugar zest of 2 lemons (approximately 1 heaping tablespoon) juice of 2 lemons (approximately one third cup) 1/2 cup chopped candied ginger 1 tsp unsalted butter 1/2 cup chopped fresh tarragon 1. Bring berries, sugar, lemon juice, and ginger to a boil over medium heat stirring occasionally. If desired, mash berries with the back of the spoon while stirring. 2. For a well set jam, bring to 220 degrees. This will take at least 30 minutes. For a looser jam, bring to 118 degrees. Stir more frequently as jam nears desired temperature. 3. To test firmness of jam, coat the back of a frozen metal spoon. Draw finger through. Firm jam will not run and will be very sticky. Looser jam will still be quite soft and loose. (Ideal for a cheese well.) 4. Once jam reaches desired firmness, remove from heat. Stir in zest and tarragon. Bring to room temperature before refrigerating until ready to use. Yield: 2 cups

I've completely shifted to low methoxy (sp?) pectin for canning my jams and jellies. It completely removes the sugar requirements in the recipes, which means I add a good amount of sugar to maintain jam quality, color, and flavor, but whether the jam sets up correctly is not dependent on that at all. Low methoxy pectin (Pamona the best known, I believe) uses calcium to set rather than sugar. I got fed up with the idea that I needed 4 cups of sugar with 4 cups of fruit - I would never eat that much sugar with the fruit if I was eating it fresh. I found that I could make wonderful strawberry jam, 4 cups of berries, with only 1.5 cups of sugar, maintaining great sweetness, color, etc., with this pectin. Fix this batch, or use it as a syrup, or use it for making fruity drinks, but I have never had a failure since going to LM pectin, and although I still use sugar in my recipes it is based on what I like for flavor and consistency rather than the excess needed to set up high-methoxy pectin commonly available in grocery stores.

Thanks, Linda Lou! It probably will eventually set, but it is not pretty enough to give away, LOL! The second batch turned out beautifully. Maybe I'll try and post a picture later.

Very lovely, Rose. I love strawberries, and home garden fresh are the best -- no pesticides and so on. I've tried growing June-bearing and day-neutral. I've read and tried various things. I bought berry netting, but never had to use it. I applaud all strawberry growers. I like your hot water bath gizmo. I only make dilly beans (now and again). I did make some strawberry freezer jam one year. Farm stand berries. The freezer jam is intensely flavorful of genuine fresh strawberries. My father was a big fan. But the drawbacks were a LOT of sugar is required -- and many people should be cautious of too much sugar. And the other of course is that it uses up a lot of freezer space if you make more than say 10 jars. I hope you don't mind but because I love the color of strawberry jam, I took the liberty to attempt and editing of your photograph so that it might show the gorgeous color of your jam. I hope you don't mind but I wanted to better see the beautiful color of your strawberry jam, so I edited it a little bit to brighten the jars. I don't have Photoshop anymore, and this was done with an older iPad. As you probably know, when you want to take a photo of a dark subject, there are a few things you can do so that it gets sufficient lighting. You can focus in on, say, one jar's contents (which in this case would be the dark berries), or you can place the jars on a darker surface so that your camera's light meter doesn't get thrown off by the bright light from either the window or your countertop or towel. It can be very tricky photographing such a contrasting areas. Oh, I just remembered, one thing. I used to preserve something that was so delicious and beautiful -- pickled crabapples. Each crabapple was about the size of a 50 Cent peace or a bit smaller, and in each jar I put a syrup and then things like cinnamon stick, clove, maybe other pickling spices and of course the syrup and vinegar and sugar in it. But the real kicker was how incredibly gorgeous they looked on a backlit kitchen windowsill. Great job, Rose. Excuse typos I have tendinitis and so I'm trying to use the voice recognition on my device.