Category Archives: Fruit

Redcurrant Cordial

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REDCURRANT CORDIAL

I’ve never known what to do with redcurrants and have always tended to give them away or do nothing with them. However, this year John had the brilliant idea of experimenting with making cordial as a replacement for the grape/apple juice we buy to mix with soda.

We actually made 3 versions and then did a blind taste test to see which one we preferred:

The first contained 100% sugar, the second contained 50% sugar and 50% sweetener and the third contained 100% sweetener.

Completely unexpectedly, the one that we both preferred was the one with 100% sweetener as you were able to get the full redcurrant taste.

Redcurrant Cordial

For this recipe, you need something to strain the fruit from the juice and for this I used the Jelly & Jam Strainer Stand & Muslin Bag that I’d bought from Lakeland.

Rather than using sugar to sweeten the cordial, we decided to use an artificial, low-calorie sweetener containing Eritritol and Sucralose that we bought in the Spanish supermarket Mercadona in Spain .

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 kg redcurrants
  • 800 ml water
  • sugar or sweetener

METHOD

  1. Wash the redcurrants and remove any stalks or leaves.
  2. Put them in a large stainless steel saucepan and add the water.
  3. Bring to the boil, cover with a lid and simmer for about ten minutes.
  4. Leave to cool.
  5. Transfer the currants and juice to a jam strainer and leave to strain.
  6. Measure the amount of juice obtained.
  7. If you are using sweetener, calculate 50g for every 570 ml of juice.
  8. Put the juice and sweetener back in the saucepan and bring to the boil.
  9. Boil for 10 minutes.
  10. Transfer to bottles and leave to cool completely before putting in the freezer until needed. 

Strawberry Jam with Powdered Pectin

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STRAWBERRY JAM WITH POWDERED PECTIN

As I’ve never been able to buy jam sugar with added pectin in Spain, in the past when making strawberry jam, the only option was to boil the juice vigorously until it was thicker.

I’ve just bought some powdered pectin and so yesterday, we had a go at using it to make strawberry jam. The jam was a success and the strawberry jam had a perfect consistency.

INGREDIENTS

  • 1kg strawberries
  • 37g powdered pectin
  • 490g sugar

METHOD

  1. Combine strawberries and pectin in a large pan.
  2. Squilch with your fingers to mix the pectin in thoroughly and to squash the whole strawberries.
  3. Bring to a gentle boil, stirring all the time.
  4. Add the sugar and mix well.
  5. Bring back to a gentle boil for 1 minute.
  6. Put into clean jam jars.
  7. Put a silicone mat on the bottom of the pressure cook and add 1 litre of boiling water.
  8. Bring to pressure.
  9. Turn down the heat and cook for 10 minutes.
  10. Leave to cool for 5 minutes.
  11. Run cold water over the pressure cooker to quickly release the pressure.
  12. Transfer the jars to a flat surface.
  13. Invert the jars and leave for 30 minutes before turning back.

Kumquat and Lemon Marmalade using a pressure cooker

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I have never made marmalade before and have always been put off by the seemingly  never-ending, tedious task of chopping, peeling, shredding, juicing, boiling, testing, etc. But when a friend told me about his method of making kumquat and lemon marmalade by soaking the fruit in sugar for a day, I thought I would give it a go. In his recipe, the kumquats are halved, the pips removed, and then combined in a bowl with lemon juice and sugar for 24 hours before boiling as normal.

My challenge, therefore, was to invent a recipe for a pressure cooker which would be even easier and quicker to prepare. A neighbour’s sister makes quince jelly in a pressure cooker by combining equal parts of fruit and sugar and then cooking for 3 minutes at pressure so I decided to experiment with times to see if this method would be possible for marmalade.

The first attempt was a success (although the cooking times needed tweaking) and I was really pleased with the consistency, texture and taste of the first batch. I had literally thrown everything in together (pips, pith and lemon quarters) but decided that for the second attempt I would tie the pips and lemon pith and skins in muslin to keep them separate.

It was clear that three minutes was far too short and I had to bring the cooker back up to pressure several times. So I decided that for the second attempt I would cook the marmalade for 15 minutes at pressure.

INGREDIENTS
500g kumquats
2 large lemons
400g brown sugar or half the weight of the prepared fruit

METHOD
Cut the kumquats in half, remove the pips and save on a muslin square. Cut the loquats into 2mm slices.
Peel the lemon rind with a vegetable peeler. Shred the rind into 2mm strips.
Put an empty bowl on the scales and weigh in the fruit and lemon juice. Add half the amount of sugar and mix well.
Securely tie up the lemon pith and pips in the muslin square and add toe the bowl of fruit.

Leave for 24 hours, stirring every so often. At the end of that time, the sugar will have completely dissolved and there will be quite a bit more syrup.

Transfer the kumquats and the muslin bag to a pressure cooker. Bring up to pressure and cook for 15 minutes. Remove the pressure cooker from the heat and slow release the pressure.

Open the pressure cooker and transfer immediately into clean glass jars using a jam funnel and a measuring jug. Turn all the jars upside down to sterilise the caps for about half an hour and then turn back the right way and leave to cool completely.

First figs of the year

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first figs of the season

First figs of the season

Today we had our first figs of the season. They were from a tree which doesn’t normally produce the early variety and not many of the later variety in September. This was the first year that the “brevas” (early figs) had grown and we had them for lunch today. They were absolutely delicious and had stayed on the tree long enough to well and truly ripen so that they were soft and sweet.