More Apple Jellies

Back to the long-neglected blog! 

As Autumn turns cold and soggy, I only have to look at my now-full preserves shelf to feel cheered. 

This has been an incredible year for all kinds of fruit.  Our Bramley tree which last year produced a grand total of 3 apples, has this year excelled itself and we have had more than we know what to do with.  Of course we've made great efforts to use what we can in cakes, puddings and chutneys, and I've enjoyed experimenting with a couple of new jams and jellies, as well as the 'usuals' (apple chilli, apple rosemary, and apple mint, instructions for which can be found earlier in this blog).

First off, Spiced Apple Butter.  Apple Butter is a very North American treat, although I don't think I ever actually ate it when I lived in Canada.  Slightly confusingly, it contains no actual butter, but is a long-cooked apple puree, often with spices such as cinnamon added.  I decided to try a recipe that used my rather neglected slow-cooker, and the results were delicious, making the entire house smell like Christmas! 

 I've put it all into sterilised jars ready to use in some festive baking.  I have of course sampled some already and it's great on toast.

The recipe can be found here, on the Frugal Foodie Mama website.

Next was Apple Quince Jelly.  I adore quinces, with their heady, almost floral scent, but they seem very difficult to come by in the shops.  This year I was lucky and managed to pick up a few windfalls locally. 

The flavour is intense so you actually don't need many to produce a beautiful preserve, bulked up of course with some apples!  Just look at this gorgeous colour, and it tastes wonderful too.  It's currently my breakfast toast-topping of choice.

I found the recipe here, on this nice foodie blog.

Finally, Apple Sloe Jelly.  The hedgerows are laden with sloes this year.  I have never used them for anything, save for drinking my father's homemade Sloe Gin!  On the tree they are mean fruit, small, hard and lip-puckeringly sour, but I felt sure that there must be potential for using them in something other than liqueur. 

A quick google brought me to this recipe, on The Cottage Smallholder (which incidentally is a fabulous blog, bursting with useful recipes).  Like the Quince jelly, this is a luscious colour, dark ruby red and gloriously clear (never squeeze the jelly bag when you're straining the fruit, otherwise your jelly will be cloudy).  I had slightly too much of this to fit in the available jars, so I'm currently working my way through a bowl of it on my toast.  (I eat a lot of toast!).  It's also  popular with the youngest member of the household.  

 I turn my back for a second...

The recipe indicates that this is a good jelly to eat with meats, but personally I think it's a little too sweet for that.  There's a lot of sugar in there (and I used a little less than the 1.5lb per pint stipulated as I ran out of sugar), so the sourness of the sloes has disappeared in my batch.  This makes it perfect as a jam, but probably not so suitable for eating with your sausages.  If I were to make it again (and I will) I think I would use 1lb of sugar per pint of juice, as you do usually when making jellies.

So all in all a successful year of preserving.  Just in case I forget to blog it properly, I also experimented with a new chutney, one that includes tomatoes.  The recipe is here, on the BBC Good Food website.  I used red pepper instead of green, but otherwise the recipe was unchanged by me.  It's still maturing in jars so I have yet to taste it, but I'm looking forward to it!

Hedgerow Jelly

Any walk through the English countryside during September and October can provide a multitude of treats for the eagle-eyed forager.  Forget that, there's no need for eagle-eyes - Autumn's fruits are everywhere!  People with apple trees in their gardens have just begun to leave baskets of fruit on their driveways, accompanied by scrawled notices beseeching passers-by to 'Please take some apples!', so of course I have obliged.

However, last weekend there was no need to look for cultivated fruit.  A quick cycle-ride along the canal towpath yielded basketfuls of hedgerow treasures which were just perfect for the 'Hedgerow Jelly' recipe I had had my eye on for a while.

We couldn't bear to get rid of these Fruits de l'Ontario baskets!

Fond memories of buying them full of ripe Niagara peaches and grapes...

Rob got carried away with picking blackberries, as you can see.

However, blackberries were not what I was after...  I had noticed some crab-apple trees up the towpath, and as the recipe called for half the quantity of fruit to be apples, I thought that these would be more appropriate than the apples I had 'foraged' from people's driveways!  I also filled my basket with rosehips and haws (from the hawthorn tree).  I knew that rosehips were edible - they were commonly gathered to make a Vitamin C-rich syrup, particularly during wartime last century - but I had never tried using them.  However, until recently I was unaware that haws were edible and as there's such a profusion of them this year, it seemed a shame not to try them.  Eaten straight from the tree they are uninspiring; slightly mealy and flavourless, but it seems that they have a multitude of potential health benefits, so that seems reason enough to include them in this recipe.

The recipe is, once again, from Pam Corbin's excellent River Cottage Handbook 'Preserves'.  This is fast becoming one of my cookery book essentials, and is certainly the book from which I have cooked most recipes over the past few months.  Typically, this recipe is gloriously flexible, allowing you to use whatever hedgerow treats you find, but with Pam's own favourite combinations suggested too.

500g crab apples (or apples)

500g mixed hedgerow berries (a combination of 2 or 3 of these is suggested: rosehips, elderberries, haws, bullaces, sloes, damsons, etc)

900g white sugar

Pick over your fruit, removing stalks and leafy bits and rinsing the berries if necessary.  Don’t peel or core the apples (they’re an excellent source of pectin), just chop them roughly.  Place all the prepared fruit in a saucepan with 1.2 litres of water and simmer until all the fruit is soft and pulpy.

Turn the contents into a bowl lined with a scalded muslin cloth, and leave to drip overnight.  I tie mine up by the corners and hang it off a clothes-airer with the bowl underneath, which seems to work very effectively, even if it looks a little odd!

The next day measure the juice – you will probably have about 1.2 litres, though this will depend on the berries used.  For every 600ml juice allow 450g sugar.  Put the juice into a large pan and slowly bring to the boil.  Add the sugar as it just comes to the boil and keep stirring until the sugar has dissolved.  Then boil rapidly, without stirring, for 9-10 minutes until the setting point is reached.  Skim the jelly and pot (in sterilised jars) and seal as quickly as possible.  Use within 12 months. 

This recipe can easily be halved, which was in fact what I did.  As you can see, this particular combination of berries produced a gorgeous clear ruby-red jelly, which almost glows as the Autumn sun shines through it.

 

The jelly can be spread on toast, or crumpets (to be eaten in front of a roaring fire of course!) but is equally at home used as a condiment with a roast dinner.  I have a real fondness for fruity jellies eaten in this way, but I think that's something that you either love or hate.  Either way, it's a perfect way to enjoy the loveliness of the new season. 

 

Stolen Treasures

If a tree laden with fruit is growing in someone's garden, but the fruit is hanging over a public footpath, then is it stealing if you pick it?  This was the question that flitted through my mind as I hurriedly filled my empty sandwich box with luscious sweet Mirabelle plums on a local walk a few weeks ago.

I had done a cursory check into said garden, and established that no one was home, and salved my conscience by telling myself that there were literally thousands of plums on this tree...  but I couldn't help but feel a little guilty about taking them.

However, once home I put all guilt aside and set to turning these golden beauties into jam. 

Mirabelles are a small variety of plum - the perfect size for stoning with a cherry-pitter, and much less messy to do so!  They were perfectly ripe so were stoned with ease, and were soon bubbling away with some sugar and water. 

The recipe I used - this one, from the fabulous River Cottage 'Preserves' handbook by Pam Corbin - instructed one to crack some of the plum stones to extract the kernels and give the jam a slight almondy flavour.  But this sounded dangerous (I had visions of trying to bash them open with a hammer...) so instead, just as setting point was reached I added a scant teaspoon of almond essence.  This has provided a wonderful addition to the fruitiness of the jam - the almond flavour is subtle, but adds a real depth to the preserve. 

As you can see, I upped the almond level in one of my three jars by stirring through a generous handful of slivered almonds, which should provide an interesting texture.  I had never added nuts to a jam, but I have my fingers crossed that it will be a successful experiment.

A quick check through my kitchen cupboard has revealed that I now have 5 different varieties of home-made jam, all made in recent months.  With blackberries still to come, I fear that there will be even more by the time 2009 ends.  We don't even eat that much jam...  I think we'll just have to make the clotted cream tea a weekly occurance!