Quince marmalade: amber, and it sets without any pectin sachet
Raw quince is practically inedible: hard as wood, astringent and sour. But it is one of the richest in pectin of all the fruit grown in Polish gardens, so its marmalade sets on its own without anything added, and after an hour of cooking it turns from pale yellow to deep amber, almost red. That colour comes from long cooking and there is no way to hurry it.
Your own work in that: 1 h 50 min.
- Cutting 25 min
- Cooking the fruit 60 min
- With sugar 85 min
- Jars 25 min
Step by step
0 / 6 doneRub off the fuzz and chop
Rub the quinces with a rough cloth to remove the grey fuzz — left on, it gives the marmalade a faint bitterness. Wash, quarter and cut out the cores, but do not throw them away. Cut the flesh into 2 cm cubes; the knife will meet real resistance, which is normal. Tie the cores and pips into a piece of muslin.
Ingredients: 2000 g quinces · 1000 g sugar · 500 ml water · 1 pcs lemon, juice · 1 pcs cinnamon stick
TipDon't peel them. The skin holds most of the aroma and after an hour of cooking it disappears completely anyway.
Fuzz rubbed off, cores into muslinSimmer with the bag of pips
Put the quince cubes in a large, wide pot and add the water (it will not cover the fruit — that is enough, as the quince stews under the lid in its own juice and steam), add the muslin bag and the lemon juice, cover and simmer over low heat 60 minutes, until the fruit is completely soft. Stir from the bottom every quarter of an hour so nothing catches. The pips and cores release their pectin into the pot — they are the reason this sets by itself.
TipThe lemon is not only for flavour: pectin only forms a gel in acid conditions, and a very ripe quince can be too mild on its own.
An hour covered, the bag floating in the potLift out the bag and purée
Take out the muslin and squeeze it against the side of the pot with a wooden spoon — a thick, slippery gel rich in pectin runs out. Blend the pulp smooth with a stick blender, or push it through a sieve if you want a marmalade with no fibre at all.
Add the sugar and cook uncovered
Stir in the sugar, add the cinnamon stick and cook uncovered over medium heat 60–70 minutes, stirring every few minutes and constantly towards the end. The colour moves from pale yellow to orange to deep amber. Take care: thick marmalade spits and burns like lava.
Ingredients: 2000 g quinces · 1000 g sugar · 500 ml water · 1 pcs lemon, juice · 1 pcs cinnamon stick
TipSugar always goes in after the fruit is soft, never before. Added at the start it stops the fruit softening and the quince stays hard even after very long cooking.
From pale yellow through orange to amberDo the cold saucer test
Put a teaspoon of marmalade on a cold saucer from the freezer and wait a minute. Draw a finger through it: if the trail does not close up, it is done. If it floods back, cook another 10 minutes and test again.
TipNever judge the set in the hot pot — hot marmalade always looks too loose. The cold saucer is the only reliable test.
The trail your finger leaves should stay openJar and process
Scald the jars and lids with boiling water. Ladle the boiling marmalade in through a funnel, leaving 1 cm of headspace, wipe the rims, seal and process 15 minutes in a pot of water reaching three quarters up the jars, with a cloth on the base. Processed jars keep up to a year in a cool larder.
Ingredients: 3000 ml water for processing
Boiling marmalade into scalded jars
Before you start
What it goes with
Blue cheese and hard cheese, roast meat, or simply bread and butter. Spanish membrillo is a very similar preserve, cooked further still, until it can be sliced with a knife.
Firm enough to slice
Cook it 30 minutes longer and pour it onto a lined tray in a 2 cm layer. After two days in a dry place it sets firmly enough to cut into cubes.
How much it makes
2 kg of quince gives about 5 jars of 300 ml. Cooking with the sugar drives off a lot of water and the mixture spits, so use a big, wide pot.
Quince vs japonica
Japonica (the small hard fruit from the ornamental shrub) is sharper still and has less flesh. It works the same way, but add 200 g more sugar and skip the lemon.