Marmalade Recipe Roundup

It's Februrary and that means it's marmalade season.   I love marmalade.  Nothing is as beautiful this time of year as a jar of citrusy sunshine.

I love marmalade on toast.   Also, on pancakes.  Also, on Blueberry Steel Cut Oats with yogurt.  Also, on brownies.   Also, on ice cream.    Also, on brownies with ice cream.



I love marmalade!  

Here are a few tips and recipes to get you started.   

• Marmalade Tools
• Mixed Fruit Marmalade
• Four Fruit Marmalade
• Rhubarb Marmalade
• Honey Vanilla Orange Marmalade
• Blood Orange Marmalade
• Old Fashioned, Southern Style Lemon Pumpkin Pickle [Marmalade]
• Chocolate Orange Marmalade

And once you have the jam made, here are some fabulous things you can do with it!

Orange Marmalade Cranberry Jammy Oatcakes

Eric's Jam Bars

Blintzes


Want the recipe for these Marmalades and a whole lot of other terrific jam recipes?   Check out my ebook:  A Simple Jar of Jam  at www.rurification.etsy.com.   You can preview the book by clicking the link on the sidebar.  Every purchase helps support this site.  Thank you!

Kumquats

Confession.   I think kumquats are adorable.

A. Dor. A. Ble.

So I've been wanting to preserve some for a long time.   Just 'cause they're cute.

Even though I didn't know what they actually tasted like. 

Especially when I found a few links to some kumquat jam recipes at Food in Jars. [halfway down the link list in that post.]   Seriously beautiful food. 

So, when I found these tiny ones at Trader Joe's up in Indy last weekend, I grabbed a box, then came home and preserved a very small batch - just one pint jar - with honey and vanilla.

I'm going to just come right out and say this:  Kumquats are weird. 

The peels are the sweet fruity part and the insides are sour.   Very sour.   They're sort of an inside out marmalade experience - you know, the citrus, sour, bitter mashup.   They need sugar and lots of it.

Here's how I preserved these beauties:

Kumquat Preserves
www.rurification.com

12 oz. box of kumquats, washed, with stem bits removed.
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup honey
1/2 cup sugar
1 vanilla bean, sliced so the seeds are exposed

Bring to boil, then reduce heat to simmer.  Let simmer until peels are transparent - about an hour.

It made just one pint.

Notes:    I was hoping that they'd keep their shape, and they probably would have if I hadn't cooked them so long.

I cooked them so long because that's the best way to candy those peels.  The longer they cook in sugar water, the better they taste.

They're still pretty puckery.   You could leave out the water and add another 1/4 - 1/2 cup of honey and probably get a nice and very balanced preserve.  Next time I find some of these, I'm going to try that. 

Pear Plum Vanilla Pie Filling

I love pear season.   Pears go brilliantly with lots of other fruit.  

The first thing I do is process them.   I don't wait until they're soft to process them because one year I waited too long and now there is a permanent stain on our wood floor where the box sat and the pears on the bottom rotted before I got to them.  

Eww.   [Although that stain is kind of pretty.]

So now I just process them as soon as I get them. Peel, core and cut them up into a pot. Once they're cut up, I put in enough water just to barely cover and then I boil them.   Once they're boiled, I put them in the fridge, water and all and use them in pie fillings, jams, etc.    You can drain off the water and make terrific pear jelly with it. 

Last year I made the most delicious jam in the world with my cooked pears.   Pear Plum Vanilla Jam. The very best jam in the universe.  

[I know I say that about a lot of stuff...What's your point?]

That jam is so good that this year, the girls and I wondered if we could make that into a pie filling.  

Um.  YUM!

So we did. 

We made enough for 8 pies.   Feel free to cut this recipe down for as few as you need.

Pear Plum Vanilla Pie Filling
www.rurification.com

• 12 cups plums [we used some red plums that we had frozen earlier this fall]
• 1 gallon cooked pears with the water they were cooked in
• 2 cups Perma Flo 
• 2 vanilla beans, cut in half, then sliced open lengthwise
• 4 cups sugar

Cut the plums in half and take out the seeds.  Prepare vanilla beans.    Pour off 2 1/2 - 3 cups of the pear water and combine it with the Perma Flo.  Whisk until well combined.    Combine all ingredients in a very large pot and bring to a boil.   You can leave the vanilla beans in or take them out before you put the finished filling into jars.

We put the cooked filling into quart jars and processed for canning 30 minutes. 

Delicious!!

Vanilla Yogurt

I know it looks like ice cream, but it's really yogurt. 

Really.

We've been perfecting our yogurt this year, trying to get it thick.   Also, I've been trying to get a version of yogurt that K2 likes, because we mostly eat plain yogurt with jam and that plain stuff is tart. 

We get our yogurt culture from www.cheesemaking.com.   We love it and go through a lot of it, so I buy the bulk packages. 

We've made it with regular store milk, and organic milk and raw milk.   By far the thickest, best yogurt is made with raw milk.  Heat it to 185 degrees, then cool it to 112 degrees and add the culture.   One packet per half gallon of milk. 
Best. Yogurt. Ever. 

Claire still wasn't interested. Too tart. [Says the kid who drinks gallons of lemonade with as little sugar as possible.  Go figure.]

The first thing we did was drain the whey off the yogurt.  The whey is the sourest stuff and I was hoping that once we drained it, it would be nice and even thicker [it was] and enough less-tart that K2 would eat it [she didn't].   The rest of us Love It. 

Soooo.    I started thinking about vanilla yogurt.    A little sugar, a vanilla bean....

Yum.

After just a bit of experimenting, we found that this made The Best Vanilla Yogurt In The Entire Universe Bar None.  

The Best Homemade Vanilla Yogurt in the Universe
www.rurification.com

• 1 gallon raw milk [or whatever milk you want to use.  This is America.]
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 vanilla beans, split
• 2 packets Y5 yogurt culture from New England Cheesemaking Co.

Put the milk, sugar and vanilla beans in a big pot.  Heat to 185 degrees, stirring frequently. Once it reaches 185, remove the pot from the heat and let it cool to 112 degrees.   Once it reaches 112 degrees, stir in the contents of both packets of culture.  Stir well.   Cover with a towel and let sit for 12 - 18 hours.  If you're in a cool or drafty place, you can culture it in your microwave or oven or a cooler over night.   Just drape a towel or two around it to keep it warm.  

It'll be very thick the next day.   If you want to make it even thicker, line a large colander with cheesecloth and put the yogurt in it.   Twist the ends/corners together and let it sit for 1-2 hours.   We usually get 2-3 quarts of really thick yogurt after an hour of draining.    The longer it drains, the drier it gets.   If you drain it for many hours, you'll end up with fantastic Vanilla Yogurt Cheese.   Heaven.

When it reaches the consistency you want, spoon it into jars and remove the vanilla beans.  Refrigerate the yogurt or cheese. 

Rinse the cheesecloth in cold water until it's mostly clean and then you can run it through the washer and drier.   [That is what I do whenever I drain any type of cheese in cloth.]

Cherry Vanilla Jam

It's the cheery cherry time of year.   If you're lucky enough to score some sour pie cherries, then try this jam.   It's really excellent with whipped cream cheese over pancakes. 

Cherry Vanilla Jam
www.rurification.com

4 cups pitted cherries
1 cup water or juice
4 Tablespoons low-sugar pectin [such as Ball or Dutch All Natural Lite]
2 cups sugar
2 Tablespoons vanilla extract

Combine the cherries, water/juice and pectin.    Bring to hard boil.  [A hard boil is one you can't stir down.]   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Add sugar and vanilla.   Stir well and return to a hard boil.   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Ladle into jars.  Cap with clean lids and rings.

For this recipe and more than 180 others, check out my ebook  A Simple Jar of Jam.  You can preview it by clicking the preview link on my sidebar. 

Strawberry Vanilla Jam

It's finally summer.   I scored these berries a couple of weeks ago, fresh from the field.  I bought a whole flat figuring on making jam and eating as many fresh as we wanted.  

I spent an hour hulling and slicing the berries - 2 gallons in all.

K2 requested a few batches of her favorite Strawberry Vanilla Jam.  It's an easy recipe and makes a delicious jam.  I made two big batches

Strawberry Vanilla Jam
www.rurification.com

5 cups sliced strawberries
1 cup water
5 tablespoons low sugar pectin
3 cups sugar
2 tablespoons vanilla extract

Crush the berries and put them in a big pot with the water and pectin.   Stir to dissolve the pectin.  Bring to a hard rolling boil.  Boil 1 minute.   Add sugar and vanilla and stir well until dissolved.  Return to hard boil.  Boil hard for 1 minute.  Ladle into jars.

Yield:  3.5 pints

I don't think jam could get much easier than that.  

For more recipes as easy as this one, check out my ebook on the sidebar.  A Simple Jar of Jam: 180+ recipes & variations for jam using low sugar pectin.

Honey Vanilla Orange Marmalade

We got a bit of honey from our bees last year and I thought it would be nice to pair it up with some orange marmalade.   And then I thought I'd jazz it up a bit more and add a vanilla bean.

Hello, Sunshine!    This is a brilliant improvisation on the marmalade theme.  It was easy, too.



Honey Vanilla Orange Marmalade
www.rurification.com

4 oranges, sectioned and zested
1 cup water
1 cup honey
1 cup sugar
1 vanilla bean [or a half if you want more honey flavor to shine through]

Zest the oranges first and boil the zest in the water and honey while you're sectioning the rest of the fruit.  Cut the vanilla bean in half and slice up the half to release the seeds.  Put all of the ingredients together in a large pot and boil until it reaches 220 degrees or the gelling temp you need for your altitude [see my Jam page, tab above, for that information.] Remove the vanilla bean.   Ladle into jars.   Process 10 minutes for canning. 

Note:  You can keep that vanilla bean and use it again, or you can drop it in a jar of sugar and let the sugar absorb the flavor.   That's what I do.   That sugar makes some amazing cookies.   And is great in tea.   Or in another batch of jam - like strawberry.  Mmmm.



Want the recipe for this Marmalade and a whole lot of other terrific jam recipes?   Check out my ebook:  A Simple Jar of Jam  at www.rurification.etsy.com.   You can preview the book by clicking the link on the sidebar.  Every purchase helps support this site.  Thank you!

Pear Vanilla Nutmeg Jam

With more of my lovely cooked pears, I whipped up a batch of this delicious jam.   The vanilla and nutmeg don't overwhelm the pear flavor.    That's important in a jam.     You don't want the embellishments to take over.

If the embellishments take over the substance then you end up with something akin to Lady Gaga and though that's entertaining and all, it's not something you want to sit down to the table with.

Substance before embellishment.

And in this jam, the embellishments embellish and the substance shines through.   

Jam as a metaphor for life.

Because this is an all purpose blog.

Pear Vanilla Nutmeg Jam

• 4 cups cooked pears
• 1 vanilla bean split lengthwise [or 2 tablespoons vanilla extract]
• 1 tsp nutmeg
• 4 tablespoons Dutch Jell All Natural Lite pectin
• 2 cups sugar

Combine the pears, nutmeg, vanilla and pectin in a pot.   Add some extra cold water if your pears are too dry and you're afraid they'll burn.  Stir constantly.  Bring to a hard rolling boil that you can't stir down.   Boil one minute. Add sugar and return to hard rolling boil.   Take out vanilla bean.  Boil one minute.   Ladle into jars.

This jam was a huge hit with with my kid who only eats ''normal' jam, Mom'.   She licked the spoon and the spatula and the funnel and the pot.  Clean. 

Note:   Remember, pears in a can are cooked pears.  You can use them if you don't have 'fresh' ones.   Use unsweetened ones. 

Peach Pie Filling

Last year I made peach pie filling in a jar.   The kind that all I had to do was open it up and pour it in a pie crust and bake.  

I love that kind.

It was delicious.  Here's the link.

So this year, I decided to make some more with our peach bounty.

Only I wanted to do something a little different than just nutmeg.

So I added some red raspberries and vanilla.

Raptures.

I made a big batch so I'd have several bottles.    I'm so glad I did.

Peach Raspberry Vanilla Pie Filling

• 16 cups chopped peaches
• 2 cups raspberries
• 4 Tablespoons lemon juice
• 4 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup corn starch
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 4 Tablespoons vanilla

Mix it all together and bring to a boil.   It'll get clear when the corn starch does it's thing.   Yield 4 quarts.  Process for canning 20 minutes.

Note:   The cornstarch will do just fine in this pie filling for 6 months.   After that it starts to separate a bit.   Make sure you keep these at the front of the cupboard so you remember to use them first.

Bon apetit!     [Is that how you spell that?]

Peach Raspberry Vanilla Jam

In addition to all the spiced peach jams I made, I wanted something with a little less ping.

I wanted pink instead of ping. 

There are a couple of ways to make peach jam pink.

1.  You can leave the skins on when you cook it, but my kids hate the whole fruit skin thing.  [And I totally roll my eyes whenever it comes up because they Really. Care. Mom.]  So I'd have to get the skins out, or run the whole thing through a sieve, but that seemed like a lot of extra work.   I don't need more work.

2.  You can add food coloring.    Nope.   I don't think so.

3.  You can add red raspberries.  Oh. Yes.

We went with #3.   It's pink AND it combines two lovely flavors.

And then we added vanilla.

Because I totally heart vanilla. 

I might have said that before.

And this is how it went:

Peach Raspberry Vanilla Jam

• 3 cups peaches
• 2 cups red raspberries
• 1 Tablespoon lemon juice
• 1/3 cup Dutch Jell All Natural Lite pectin  OR  3 Tablespoons Ball Low Sugar Pectin
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 Tablespoons vanilla.

Mix the peaches, raspberries, lemon juice and pectin in a large pot.   Bring to hard rolling boil, stirring constantly.  Boil hard for 1 minute.    Add sugar and vanilla.  Stir well and bring back to hard rolling boil, stirring constantly.   Boil hard for 1 minute.   Ladle into jars and process 10 minutes for canning.  Yield 3 pints.

Note:  You can easily make vanilla extract yourself.   Try it. You'll never go back.

Cherry Jam, Three Ways

Thanks to Murphala, we were recently able to pick a whole bunch of Montmorency cherries.   It had been years since I'd had fresh sour cherries.

I love sour cherries.

We had enough to make three batches of jam, so I tried it three different ways.   Here's the basic recipe.



Batch #1
Basic Cherry Jam

• 4 cups pitted cherries
• 2/3 cup water or juice
• 3 Tablespoons Ball Low Sugar Pectin
• 2 cups sugar

Combine the cherries, water/juice and pectin.    Bring to hard boil.  [A hard boil is one you can't stir down.]   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Add sugar.   Stir well and return to hard boil.   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Ladle into jars.  Cap with clean lids and rings.  Process for canning 10 minutes in water bath or steam canner.  

***
Easy. 

To jazz it up, I decided to do a batch with vanilla. 

Here's the thing about vanilla jam recipes.   Inevitably, they call for a vanilla bean.   Which I have.   In the freezer.   And which I am more than happy to use in jam.   That's what they're for.  

You have to split the bean and scrape out the seeds.   Not a big deal.   Except the seeds get kind of gooey and then they clump and I hate that and if you've got a pale jam, then the seeds show up and look like pepper, which can be off putting to some people.   The jam is always delicious in the end, but .... you know.... maybe there's another way.

I tried 2 Tablespoons of my homemade vanilla extract instead of a vanilla bean. 

Worked like a charm.   Here's the recipe.  This one is K2's favorite.

Batch #2
Cherry Vanilla Jam

• 4 cups pitted cherries
• 2/3 cup water or juice
• 3 Tablespoons Ball Low Sugar Pectin
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 Tablespoons vanilla extract

Combine the cherries, water/juice and pectin.    Bring to hard boil.  [A hard boil is one you can't stir down.]   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Add sugar and vanilla.   Stir well and return to hard boil.   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Ladle into jars.  Cap with clean lids and rings.  Process for canning 10 minutes in water bath or steam canner. 

***

I've also been thinking about jazzing up the plain fruit jams with more spices like star anise and cardamom.    But I hate wasting fruit in crazy spice experiments so I did a little internet research first to see if such a beast as Sour Cherry Cardamom Jam existed.   It did!  Someone is selling it on Amazon.    And I found recipes for Cherry Cardamom Pie, so I figured the proportion of spice to cherries from those recipes.

I tried it and it was darn good!  Here's the recipe.   This one is Lily's favorite.

Batch #3

Cherry Vanilla Cardamom Jam

• 4 cups pitted cherries
• 2/3 cup water or juice
• 3 Tablespoons Ball Low Sugar Pectin
• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
• 2 Tablespoons vanilla extract
  

Stir cardamom and sugar together.  Set aside.

Combine the cherries, water/juice and pectin.    Bring to hard boil.  [A hard boil is one you can't stir down.]   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Add sugar/cardamom mixture and vanilla.   Stir well and return to hard boil.   Stir constantly and boil hard for 1 minute.    Ladle into jars.  Cap with clean lids and rings.  Process for canning 10 minutes in water bath or steam canner.  


***

There you have it.  Cherry Jam three ways.

Next up, peach season is coming.    I'll be experimenting with peach jams, next.

Peach Vanilla Jam

This is what my table looked like when we brought the blue berries home.   And that isn't all of them.  Or all of the peaches, either.    This is just the last of the peaches. 

We kinda have a fruit glut.

I think we'll live, though. 

I'll probably have nightmares about peaches and blueberries and some sort of alien from Dr Who.  I heart Dr. Who.    I wonder if they've done peach and blueberry aliens on Dr. Who.   Maybe I should write and suggest it.

Or maybe I should just stick to jam.

OK. 

I'd read on Food in Jars about a strawberry vanilla jam recipe, but I don't have strawberries and I'm still on that what-new-exciting-thing-can-I-do-with-peach-jam kick.

And I thought that peach vanilla jam sounded kinda good.

Actually, it sounded really good.   Really, really good. 

Have I told you how much I love vanilla?   I'm sure I have.  I love vanilla.  Really love vanilla.

So I made some Peach Vanilla Jam:

Mashing the peaches and vanilla during cooking

1 Cup water
4 Cups peaches, cut up
3 Tablespoons Ball pectin [or 1 pkg]
2 vanilla beans
2 Cups sugar

Put the water and peaches and pectin in a heavy pot and start cooking. 

Cut the vanilla beans lengthwise and scrape out the seeds with a spoon.   [Just open up the bean, hold it over the pot, start anywhere and scrape, scrape, scrape.]  That's the stuff in the pic that looks like pepper.

It's not pepper, it's vanilla bean seeds.    They smell great.   My hands still smell good.   I heart vanilla.  

Cook and mash until you get the consistency you want.   When you're done mashing, stir frequently until you reach a hard boil.   Hold the hard boil for 1 minute. 

Add the sugar.   Stir until it reaches hard boil again.  Hard boil for 1 minute.

Ladle into jars. Makes two and a half pints.  Process for canning.   [Pints and jelly jars 10 minutes].

Notes:   Notice that in the pic, some of the jars are pink.    That's because I was kind of weirded out by the black specs in the yellow jam in the first couple of jars.   

Since I had an abundance, [an abundance! I tell you], of blueberries, I threw 8 blueberries into the jam at the last minute just for the color.   I didn't want blueberry flavor, just the color.

And I like that color!   A lot!   And it hides the black specs.    I'd do it again.

Raspberries would have worked, too.    Next time I might try them instead. [Update:  I tried blackberries, but they broke apart and didn't color as well.   Stick with blueberries.]

Vanilla Sugar

I heart vanilla.   Really, really, really heart vanilla.

We go through a lot of vanilla and since I make my own, I have all these vanilla beans just hanging around.   I get them in quantity and keep them in the freezer.    I don't care if they turn a little gray-ish before I use them.   As long as they impart that fabulous flavor, and scent, I'm a happy camper.

I made vanilla this week and while I had the beans out, I decided to make some vanilla sugar.  I used three beans and I left them tall because they fit that way into my sugar jar.   It's a two step process.

1.   Put the vanilla beans in the sugar.
2.   Wait


Step 2 is the hardest because you have to wait longer than 15 minutes.   I know.    I tried.    It's best if you wait a few days.   

Yes, days.  It's ridiculous, but what can you do?   

Since the beans have some moisture in them, the sugar might get a little clumpy - at least that's what happens in Indiana, where it's humid, because this spring it rained every day for six years.  Seriously.  

OK, I'm exaggerating.   It was much closer to only one year. And we had to build arks and start gathering the animals two by two.   And some of us started getting webbed feet.   And gills.  

It was wet, I tell you, wet. 

Where was I?    My brain has mold on it from all the blasted rain.

Oh.  Clumpy sugar.    Yeah, if the sugar clumps, just thump it with a spoon and it should be spoon-able again.   

The end.

Vanilla

I love vanilla.  I love vanilla ice cream.  I love vanilla candles. 

Just thinking about it lowers my blood pressure.   

Heaven lies in the vanilla bean; I'm sure of it.  At the very least, I expect that if you get to the pearly gates and present one to St. Peter, he'll definitely let you in. 

In the meantime, you can make your own vanilla extract.  With real vanilla beans.  And real booze.   It's totally easy.

Here is a bottle of my vanilla.  Doesn't it smell great?!   Those dark spots in it are real vanilla beans.  Here's how you do it:




1.  I start with a bottle of brandy.   My fave is E & J.  My husbands initials are E & J, but that's not why I use this.  I use this because it's brandy and it's in a pretty bottle.  

2.  You also need a vanilla bean or two...or twelve.  The more beans you use, the more powerful your extract.

You can get vanilla beans from quality spice places like Penzey's.  I got my last batch from Atlantic Spice Company.  If you're west of the Mississippi, it'll be San Francisco Herb - it's the same company but they ship from San Francisco instead of Massachusetts.  Right now, vanilla beans are $17.50 for 4 oz of beans.   That'll keep you in vanilla extract and vanilla sugar for a few years.   Store the extras in the freezer.  These companies have a minimum order of $30, but the sites are full of all sorts of herbs and spices and containers.    Make sure you check out their Miscellaneous category.  You won't have a problem meeting the $30 minimum; you'll have a problem keeping it at $30.  

3.  You can leave the beans long, but I cut them in smaller lengths because they fit on the bottom of the brandy bottle and stay submerged, thereby continuing to impart full flavor until the very last drop.

4.  Slice each bean lengthwise to expose the center.   It's not a crisis if you cut all the way through.   You're just trying to open the beans and let the seeds hit the brandy.  Some folks say to scrape the seeds out, but you don't have to.

5.  Drop the beans in the brandy bottle.  That's it.  You're done.

6.  You can put it in a window for a week or so and let the sun heat it up and release the vanilla a bit faster [plus brandy loves heat]  or you can just put it in your cupboard.   It's ready to go when you open it up and smell vanilla.