A good workout making Marmalade

[Neil Bromhall]

On this damp Sunday we decided to stay indoors make Seville orange marmalade.

My job was to help get the pith off the orange peel with a spoon. It was hard work so maybe I should ask my garden tool designer friend to see if he can invent something to remove pith from a peel and make my life easier as I love home made orange marmalade.
See the recipe for making this marmalade on the post below

[sue1002]

Yes please Neil, put the recipe up, I like home-made marmalade but I've not actually made any myself. Can the oranges be substituted for lemon and lime? as that one is my favourite.

I use a zester to get the peel off the orange, perhaps your friend could use a similar design and just make the holes bigger so you get bigger pieces of zest.

[Neil Bromhall]

Wash and halve 1kg of Seville Oranges, squeeze out the juice and reserve pips.
Cut the pith from the rind. Loosely tie up the pith and pips in muslin. The muslin bag makes it easier to remove the unwanted pith later.
Shred the rind thinly or thickly as preferred.
Place the orange juice, rind, muslin bag, 2.5litre of water and the juice of 1 large lemon in a large saucepan. Bring to the boil and simmer gently uncovered for 2 hours or until reduce by half and rind is soft.
Remove the muslin bag, add 2kg of sugar and stir over a low heat until dissolved. Boil rapidly until the temperature reaches 104 degree C or when a little of the marmalade spooned on to a cold plate sets. Remove from the heat, skim off any white froth and leave for 15 minutes before putting into sterilised jars.
This made enough marmalade to fill x 5 400g jars

[sue1002]

Thanks for that Neil, I will definitely be giving it a go. How many normal sized jars does it make?

[Miranda]

That looks interesting, Neil. What's the setting agent? Is that why the pith is used?

Must say that I'm not that keen on orange marmalade, but I do like it made with limes.

We tried some stewed apple that I'd bottled up not this last autumn but the one before. I'd stewed the apple and put it in Kilner jars, then heated the jars in a jam kettle of water before sealing them. There was such a good vacuum formed that we had trouble opening the jar. The fruit was still very good and we made a pie with it.

[Neil Bromhall]

There was enough for x5 normal sized jars. I can see that one jar says 400g and some of the others are slightly larger maybe 450g.

I will enquire about the setting agent.

[digger]

What's a seville orange? and where can they be bought? our local greengrocer has some oranges but they just say oranges on the label, are all oranges different like apples?

[sue1002]

Thanks Neil, I will probably half the recipe and just try a couple of jars to start off with as 5 jars would last about 3 years here. I can also try it with lemons and lime (half of each) to see if that works as well.

Digger - the Seville oranges are the big ones with a very thick skin which would make them very good for using in marmalade, they are also not as sweet as some of the thinner skinned varieties.

[digger]

I really like marmalade, I have it on toast each morning but OH doesn't like it and neither does our cheeky young son.

[Miranda]

Actually, that photo of the marmalade does make me want to eat some, right away. What glorious colours!

[Neil Bromhall]

I'm told that it's the pectin in the pith which acts as a setting agent as well as the sugar which needs to reach a boiling temperature of 102 degrees C.

[paddy]

If you are really in a hurry, you can process the fruit (pips and all) in a liquidiser/food processor and cook it with the water until peel is tender. Then add the sugar and boil and pot it up. It doesn't look so elegant but it tastes the same -you just pick out the pips as you use it.

It's really worthwhile to make your own marmalade if you like a bitter preserve. Commercial marmalade is usually much sweeter. You can make it with grapefruit and lemons and sweet oranges if you can't get Seville oranges or you can use 2 lemons, 1 grapefuit and 1 lb cooking apples, 1 bag of sugar and 2 and a half pints of water to make windfall marmalade.

paddy

[Miranda]

I like the idea with the mixed fruit, Paddy. Might have a go at that myself.

[digger]

It all sounds good fun but I don't think OH will let me loose in the kitchen with her good saucepans, seeing as there is only me who likes marmalade I will probably have to stick to "frank Cooper's" thick cut breakfast marmalade.

[sue1002]

I'm having a go at making some of the marmalade today, it is simmering away at the moment. I found it easy to use my zester to remove the peel before the oranges were cut and squeezed, then all I had to do to remove the rest of rind from the pith was to use a really sharp boning knife which sliced through it easily.

[digger]

That's a good thing to do Sue1002, Will you be entering any of your marmalade into a local show?

[sue1002]

No, I'm going to eat it all, I'm only making up half the amount as it's only really me that will eat it but I might give a jar to OH's mum.

I didn't have any muslin bags so have improvised by using a piece of net curtain (yes I did make sure it was clean first) and tied it up with string.

[Neil Bromhall]

Hi Sue
Good luck with your marmalade production.
I'm just a bloke and some of us chaps like to make out that we're the ones that do all the hard work.
You gals always make things look easy and do the hard work without a fuss or as you have done found a simple solution to the probem.

[sue1002]

Yes, us girls are famous for doing the hard work without a fuss. It looks like it has come out ok, and it tastes very strong.