3 ms·

Jam can be smooth in Britain too, the cheap ones usually are. The opposite, with chunks of fruit, is conserve. In all my years of watching TV, I've never heard

Jam can be smooth in Britain too, the cheap ones usually are. The opposite, with chunks of fruit, is conserve. In all my years of watching TV, I've never heard an American say the word jam, it must not be very popular compared to jelly.

ghc 5mo ago
Perhaps unsurprisingly, in New England jam seems more popular than jelly. The FDA regulates the labels...jelly is made from fruit juice, while jam is made from fruit chunks. The only jelly I routinely see is concord grape jelly. Jams are usually apricot, raspberry, or strawberry. Given the number of small batch jams available at various farmers markets, my guess would be that for smaller farms, making jam is more practical than jelly.
- bell-cot 5mo ago
  > ... for smaller farms, making jam is more practical than jelly. Probably true? Unless they are cheating by buying bulk commercial (filtered) juice. But if their customers prefer "I can see lots of fruit chunks in it" jam to jelly, they don't need other reasons.
OkayPhysicist 5mo ago
Unless it's relevant to the conversation ("grab some strawberry jam when you're at the store, not the strawberry jelly"), Americans are also likely to use "jelly" as the catch all for the various "preserves meant for spreading". I guess that's kind of alluded to by my suggestion to put any of them on a peanut butter and "jelly" sandwich.
abanana 5mo ago
Regarding Britain, "conserve" used to mean posh jam, but nowadays it seems to be more of a marketing word - a brand trying to pretend they're posh, similar to how pretentious restaurants use French words for no obvious reason. "Smooth jam" here in the UK is sometimes labelled as jelly, like this kind of thing: https://www.ocado.com/products/tiptree-blackberry-jelly/10533011 https://www.ocado.com/products/tiptree-blackberry-jelly/1053...
- matthewowen 5mo ago
  interestingly, i think there's also a u vs non-u thing here: jam is a u word, preserve is non-u
- nephihaha 5mo ago
  "Jeelie" is the old Scots term for jam by the way, so "jelly" does/did have currency here.
bigstrat2003 5mo ago
Jam is more popular than jelly, in my experience, but (as OkayPhysicist said) many people use the word "jelly" incorrectly to mean any kind of fruit spread.

ghc 5mo ago

Perhaps unsurprisingly, in New England jam seems more popular than jelly. The FDA regulates the labels...jelly is made from fruit juice, while jam is made from fruit chunks. The only jelly I routinely see is concord grape jelly. Jams are usually apricot, raspberry, or strawberry. Given the number of small batch jams available at various farmers markets, my guess would be that for smaller farms, making jam is more practical than jelly.

bell-cot 5mo ago
> ... for smaller farms, making jam is more practical than jelly. Probably true? Unless they are cheating by buying bulk commercial (filtered) juice. But if their customers prefer "I can see lots of fruit chunks in it" jam to jelly, they don't need other reasons.

OkayPhysicist 5mo ago

Unless it's relevant to the conversation ("grab some strawberry jam when you're at the store, not the strawberry jelly"), Americans are also likely to use "jelly" as the catch all for the various "preserves meant for spreading". I guess that's kind of alluded to by my suggestion to put any of them on a peanut butter and "jelly" sandwich.

abanana 5mo ago

Regarding Britain, "conserve" used to mean posh jam, but nowadays it seems to be more of a marketing word - a brand trying to pretend they're posh, similar to how pretentious restaurants use French words for no obvious reason. "Smooth jam" here in the UK is sometimes labelled as jelly, like this kind of thing: https://www.ocado.com/products/tiptree-blackberry-jelly/10533011 https://www.ocado.com/products/tiptree-blackberry-jelly/1053...

matthewowen 5mo ago
interestingly, i think there's also a u vs non-u thing here: jam is a u word, preserve is non-u
nephihaha 5mo ago
"Jeelie" is the old Scots term for jam by the way, so "jelly" does/did have currency here.

bigstrat2003 5mo ago

Jam is more popular than jelly, in my experience, but (as OkayPhysicist said) many people use the word "jelly" incorrectly to mean any kind of fruit spread.