This is kind of a cheater’s version, because it doesn’t involve squeezing the juice out of real grapes. While that sort of method might produce some very tasty jelly, it’s not at all cost-efficient unless you grow your own grapes or have access to free ones somehow.
How cheap your jelly is depends on the price you pay for your ingredients. If you buy grape juice and sugar on sale and you have a coupon for pectin, it will be really, really cheap. Plus, your homemade jelly will have no high fructose corn syrup in it(this is actually the reason I first looked into making my own).
I got this recipe from The Hillbilly Housewife(you can print it from the link there),(and it’s basically the same as the one on the insert from the pectin box) but I thought that some of you might be terrified of making your own jelly and would prefer a pictorial guide. 
It’s actually really, really easy. I promise.
Homemade Grape Jelly
Here’s what you’ll need:
- 3 cups grape juice (either in a bottle or prepared from concentrate)
- 1 package powdered pectin
- 4 cups sugar
- glass jars that will hold 1.5 quarts of jelly
(they don’t need to be canning jars…glass jars that used to hold fruit or applesauce, or jelly will work fine)
Combine grape juice and pectin in a saucepan(I stir it with a whisk to get rid of the lumps) and bring to a boil. As an aside, do NOT add the sugar before you bring the pectin to a boil. I’ve done this waaaay too many times, and it causes the jelly to not, well, gel.
After the pectin/juice mixture has come to a boil, stir in the sugar. Bring it back up to a full rolling boil that cannot be stirred down, and boil for a full minute.
Remove from the heat. During cooking, some foam may have appeared on the top of your jelly. I like to spoon this off.
It’s harmless, but it’ll make the top of your jelly look cloudy if you leave it there.
Ladle the jelly into your clean jars, screw on the lids, and let the jelly cool to room temperature before storing in the fridge.
If you want the jelly to be shelf-stable, you can process the jars in a large pot of boiling water for 10 minutes. I don’t mess with that usually…I store mine in the fridge, and they keep just fine.
The color of your jelly could vary depending on the grape juice you use. In my experience, the bottled grape juice makes a more purple jelly than reconstituted grape juice does. The jars above are made from bottled juice, and the jars below are from a concentrate.
They’ll both taste good, though, so use whatever sort of grape juice you like.
Sometimes, my jelly gels right away, but sometimes it takes a while(like 6-8 hours). So, don’t become distressed if at first it seems that all you have produced is some very sweet grape juice. Be patient, and as long as you’ve followed the recipe properly, your grape juice will have turned into jelly.
{ 40 comments… read them below or add one }
I remember doing this with my Mom! This is a great tutorial. Thanks so much!
Wow, this is awesome! Thanks for sharing. I hate HFCS. One tip I learned from canning is if you tip the jars on the lids and leave them there, they normally will seal automatically too!
Hi Kristen,
Miriam shared your website with me a little while ago, and though it sounds cheesy…I must confess, your frugal-ness is inspiring!
Though we do not use much jelly in my house…I may have to try making some just because.
Why do you make jelly? Is it really that much cheaper?
Ahhh this is cool! I have some recipes that call for grape jelly… this is a great way to make it!
mmm…
I love grape jelly. This is a great, easy recipe!
Bethany, I originally looked for the recipe because I couldn’t find any jelly without high fructose corn syrup in it…not even at Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods!
I do think it’s cheaper, as long as you get your pectin cheaply. I should do a cost breakdown, though!
I agree that HFCS is evil! Ok so not evil, but it’s in everything. I am trying to eliminate it as much as I can from our diets so I’ve been making many things from scratch. What I’m wondering is how does the jelly taste? Thanks for the recipe and I love that site.
I had no idea it so easy to make Grape jelly!! So Simple!
Lisa
That looks like a fun thing to do with the kids. Could you do the same thing with apple juice for apple jelly?
Yep, you sure can! I’ve been wanting to try it but haven’t yet.
Bonnie, it tastes almost exactly like the stuff you buy. Basically, it will taste like a sweeter version of the grape juice you use.
I’m definitely going to have to try it.
Of course, this will work with juice from other fruit as well, particularly apples – in which case, if done right, you may not need added pectin as apples contain quite a lot (I haven’t done this myself, mind you). For other fruit, I have a “recipe” somewhere on how to make fairly concentrated pectin extract out of otherwise non-edible apples (i.e. you use cores, skins, cooking apples, crabapples etc.). Various sorts of wild berries are edible when processed into jelly, and if you can spare the time to collect them they’re free…
(As an aside, I may be stating the obvious here, but I believe the usual way to juice things for jellies is by steaming and then straining through a muslin cloth, rather than squeezing. That’s how my grandmother once showed me how to make apple jelly, and how the recipes I’ve seen do it.)
This actually looks really interesting!! I thought it was jam until I re-read it and it’s jelly!! Reminds me of the peanut butter and grape jelly sandwiches I used to read in books!! I’m not sure if I’ll ever make them but I like it!!
I want to pour the jelly into wine glasses for gifts. How do I seal them? Pour parafin over the tops after the jelly gels or cools? Help!
Trish, I googled it, and it seems like paraffin wax is the way to go. I’ve never done that myself, though, so I can’t offer any great advice.
Do you suppose there is a way to do this in a lower calorie/less sugar sort of way?
Ben, I’ve never tried it, but I know there are low-sugar ways to make jelly and jam. Try googling it, and I’m sure you’ll find something. I know that there are special techniques you have to use if you want to cut back on the sugar content.
Does the store bought grape juice already have high fructose corn syrup?
Nope, not if you get 100% juice.
We do strawberry every year when strawberries come into season. I have a pretty big family and Pb&j is a staple here. I do two flats of berries and we get almost enough jelly to last a full year. The best part is I get to control the amount of sugar and it is 100 times better than the grocery store jelly.
Can this recipe also be frozen?
have you every tried this with red wine? I wonder if you could use the same recipe??
I have not…in fact, I’ve never had red wine jelly.
Thanks! I have been searching for a recipe that didn’t make like 15 jars of jelly. I really don’t need that much for 2 people nor have the storage for it. Thank you so much! I may mess with it a bit with some homemade juices too to get ones with less sugar. Thanks again!
Can fresh fruit be used for this jelly? I’d love to make strawberry jelly, but I’m not sure how to do it. Could I just puree the fruit, or would I need to do extensive straining?
Thanks for the great recipe and tutorial, I love your website!
Well, you’d need strawberry juice, I think, and I’m not sure how to do that.
I have a recipe for strawberry jam on my blog, though!
Extracting strawberry juice is actually not difficult at all. Purchase at least 4lbs of fresh starwberries (I always get 4-5 lbs, pending on the size of the berries) and two large lemons. Wash the berries; cut the “caps/tops” & slice berries into quarters; once all cut, mash berries into large stock pot, one layer of berries at a time (I use of stainless steel potato masher); cut lemons in half and squeeze to produce 1/4 Cup lemon juice; mix into berries.
Bring mixture to a boil, stirring frequently so as not to burn, and then simmer uncovered for 10 mins. Take a strainer (not a collander, a hand-held strainer) that has a full covering of cheese cloth (can purchase @ wal-mart, just ask), place over a deep bowl, slowly pour berries into strainer & allow juice to “fall”.
You need 3 3/4 Cups juice per batch of strawberry jelly you wish to make.
That’s all it takes to extract strawberry juice! Follow a basic jelly recipe from there if you have one. If not, Certo’s recipe says:
3 3/4 Cup juice (return to pot)
7 1/2 Cups sugar
2 pouches of Liquid Pectin
(1)Stir sugar into juice & bring to a full rolling boil (does not reduce when stirred) on high heat, stirring constantly.
(2) Quickly stir in pectin & bring back to full rolling boil for exactly one minute, stirring constantly.
(3) Skim foam from jelly; laddle into jars
Hello! I was wondering if adding the pectin-whether it be liquid or powder-prior to the sugar works for other fruits as well? (IE–strawberry, cherry, or apple?)
I have been having a bit of difficulty with my canning lately, where I have needed to re-set my jellies despite following my usual recipes. Granted on one I did try to reduce the sugar, but I did not compensate for the subtraction, so that one I understand. But is the “adding pectin & boil prior to adding sugar” a universal rule used for how you can? Do you think it would work for various fruits?
Well, I imagine you can use this sort of recipe with other prepared juices…but to be on the safe side, I’d stick to the recipes like you can find on the insert in the pectin box.
I can say that adding the sugar prior to the pectin has always equalled disaster for me!
Hi! Great post! Does the bottled or concentrated juice jelly taste better? Also, I wanted to try honey/reduced sugar version, and also adding chamomile or elderflower flavour to the jelly but I dont know what amounts to do, does anyone have advice please? Thank you
Reducing sugar will only work with special pectin-look for low-sugar pectin at your store.
Bottle or concentrated tastes the same to me!
can you double the recipe for bigger batches and it turn out ok?
I’ve read that that’s not a good idea (the pectin package directions say not to double) so I’ve never tried it.
This was my first time doing anything like this. This was fun, simple, tasty, and very easy to do!! I really had fun doing this recipe and can’t wait to do it again!!
That seems fairly easy. We make crab apple spice jam every year with the apples on our tree. The first year we lived here we were giving the apples away as they would fall to the ground and create a mess. One day the lady who picked them up for free knocked on our door the next day with apple butter and apple jelly, it was amazing. We thought, why can’t we do that and there was plenty to go around even to offer for free to whoever wanted apples. I shared this post as well on the blog but the reality is sometimes we put inconveniences first before thinking outside the box. If it wasn’t for that lady we would have never thought to make something with those apples rather than tossing them in the compost heap! Cheers Mr.CBB
I’m going to make the grape jelly for hostess gifts at Christmas. Thanks!
Barbara Thompson
Thank You for putting this recipe for me and everybody i preciate you for doing that
I never thought to use store bought juice! I’ve canned various jams for years, but grape jelly was too much effort (& I prefer jams!) I go a little crazy with my kids at u-pick berry places, but we eat lots of pb&j and many a hostess has received my homemade jams. Much more personal than another bottle of wine.
Love this. We recently discovered that my son is fructose intolerant. It has made me very aware of how much of our food contains it. Thanks for sharing the recipe.