​Savoury Quince and rosemary jelly

​Savoury Quince and rosemary jelly

Thanks to Maggie Beer. I adore her cooking style and passion.
This is a lovely jewel to have in the cupboard to serve at Christmas - or any time at all really. I made mine ahead to try - between our caravan trip to Tassie and our longer trip to the NW because that’s when the quinces were in season. I had oodles of juice left over so froze it and hope to make it into more pots of jelly before Christmas. It will be an experiment - fingers crossed it works OK!
I also saved the stewed fruit, froze the lot and plan to turn it into tarts or the like once I have time to get back into the kitchen. I have a quince and almond cake recipe I want to try; I’ll let you know if it works. So the jelly ......

Step 1 - making the juice
2Kg quinces - half green and half ripe
Water to cover - about 2L (depending on pot size)

• Rub any down off the fruit with a clean cloth. Cut fruit into 1/8th without peeling.
• Place in pot, cover with water and bring to the boil with lid on (approx 10 mins). Simmer with lid on until quinces are soft and cooked through (approx 20-30 min).
• While still warm, strain the quinces through a colander lined with muslin over a large bowl or pot. When the first of the juice ceases to run, tie the muslin into a ball that can be hung or tied around a stick and suspended over a bowl overnight at room temperature so the juices can run free (I tied mine to a cupboard handle over the stove). DON’T be tempted to squeeze the ball of quinces as that will cloud the jelly.

Depending on your quinces this should yield about 1 L of Juice. My batch produced a lot more than that. Not sure why. Perhaps I added too much water to start with. Maybe the quinces contained a lot of juice. Maybe a combination of both.

Step 2 - making the jelly
1L quince juice
750g castor sugar
250ml verjuice and 75ml lemon juice OR 250ml white wine vinegar
2 Tbsp finely chopped fresh rosemary
2 Tbsp butter
1 extra lemon optional

Method

1. Pan fry rosemary on a very small pan with butter for 1 min on low heat. Drain and blot dry.
2. Combine quince juice, castor sugar and verjuice and lemon (or vinegar) and stir till sugar dissolved. Add cooked rosemary and boil at moderate to high heat for 30 mins until jelly is deep pink and ready to set (test the same way you test jam).
3. Strain and bottle.

Chook's note: I haven’t opened my maiden batch yet. Looking forward to trying it. And now I am thinking of other jellies I could make - rosemary, mint. Perfect for summer.  My Mum made apple jelly for Dad and I remember the bag of fruit pulp dripping away slung between the legs of an upturned dining room chair in the lounge room overnight.  Woe betide anyone who dared touch the cloth and make the juice cloudy.  It was sooo tempting to help hurry up the process!