[OkayPhysicist]

They also got it wrong in their explanation. To Americans, jelly is jam with the fruit bits filtered out, leading to a homogeneous spread. Jam has crushed fruit, giving it a thicker, uneven texture, and preserves are whole-ass pieces of fruit boiled down in syrup. Marmalade is jam with citrus rinds. As listed here, they are sorted in descending desirability for inclusion in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

[Windchaser]

> As listed here, they are sorted in descending desirability for inclusion in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.

Surely you mean ascending!

Preserves > marmalade & jam > jelly

I want maximal fruit flavor for combination with my peanut butter.

Which makes me consider other options. Peanut butter and banana is a classic, ofc, but should I try even-more-concentrated fruits? Fruit jerky? Dried mangos? But then the texture would be weird; probably have to chop up the dried fruit, first. Or what about making a fruit-based tea, then using that as the water for making the bread?

Or, hell, we could subvert the entire PB&J structure. Use strawberry fruit jerky as the "bread", and PB + ... banana? as the filling. (Considered various "bread" fillings, like crushed Ritz crackers. I dunno, I'd try it. Strawberry jerky, with a little peanut butter and crushed ritz crackers in between)

[ofalkaed]

I use dried fruit, much less messy, you don't end up sticky. Raisins work very well, chopped dates are quite nice as well but a pain to apply so I generally buy whole dried dates and halve them. Sliced or chopped figs are quite good, apple rings are fantastic. Mango work fairly well as is but sometime are a bit tough, chopping is often a good idea. Chopped apricot is a favorite, cranberries were a disappointment, pineapple works well as does fresh chopped pineapple as long as you let it drain a bit before putting it on your sandwich. Sundried tomatoes and fresh sliced green pepper is better than one would expect.

Some good thin potato chips are a great way to add some crunch, I prefer Old Dutch Original, great on many sorts of sandwich.

[Windchaser]

Ahhhh, I love this food experimentation and the food data. Of my friends, I'm the one coming up with weird combos and being like "try this!", and it gives me a splash of the warm fuzzies to find other experimenters.

I swear, if ever we get proper robot maids, I'm going to give mine a sandwich roulette wheel system, with different wheels for different ingredients. "What sandwich am I eating today? Surprise me! --> {Tuna, cantaloupe, malt vinegar, fried asian noodles}"

[bigstrat2003]

This is very much a personal preference thing, I suppose. When I make a PB&J, I want no pieces of fruit whatsoever. Jam is acceptable but not preferred, while preserves are too chunky and I would just not make a PB&J at that point. Marmalade I do not use for anything because I find the bitter flavor to be extremely unpleasant.

[ryanchants]

When making a PB&J, I want just enough to jelly to add a little flavor to the peanut butter. Which is why my dad always called them "choke sandwiches" when I made them.

[walthamstow]

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.

[OkayPhysicist]

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.

[ghc]

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]

> ... 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.

[abanana]

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/1053...

[nephihaha]

"Jeelie" is the old Scots term for jam by the way, so "jelly" does/did have currency here.

[matthewowen]

interestingly, i think there's also a u vs non-u thing here: jam is a u word, preserve is non-u

[bigstrat2003]

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.

[dhosek]

I think in colloquial American English, there’s a lot of mixing up of terms and most Americans (myself included) would just call all of these jelly.

[paradox460]

Marmalade was originally just quince cheese, then jam, no citrus required