The following recipe is courtesy of a friend of mine and is based on his great grandmothers marmalade having been passed from generation to generation. It is certainly the best I have ever tried and made a batch last year and am still eating it.
It is far better than any that you can buy and is well worth the effort making it, and as a bonus Seville oranges are on sale and can be purchased fairly cheap.
1. Wash your Seville oranges (you need 1lb to make 4-5lbs of the final product) and put them in the deep freeze for at least 24 hours, with one small lemon to every pound of oranges. I use 2lbs in one session, which this week yielded 9½ pounds.
2. Take the oranges that you wish to turn into marmalade, plus the one lemon to one pound of oranges, from the freezer. Let them thaw out completely.
3. Halve the soft fruits and scoop out the seeds,pith etc into some soft cloth (muslin by the book, but a soft thin handkerchief or even a chunk of tights material will do) and knot this so that no puips can escape. I put the cloth on a stainless steel seive and put that over a bowl so no juice is lost.
4. Take the rinds and blitz them in the food precessor with sharp blade attached. The more you blitz, the finer the rind. Its up to you, but I like mine on the chunky side!
5. Put peel, bag of pips etc, and juice into the jam pan and pour in 3 pints water for every 1lbs of oranges + 1 lemon. Bring to the boil and gently simmer until the peel is very soft. I give it an hour (the books says 1½ hours, but that is for peel that has not already been softened in the freezer).
6. Add 3lbs sugar (ordinary jam sugar, without added pectin) for every 3lbs oranges/3 pints water and stir off the heat until all the sugar is dissolved. Then stir in one tablespoon black treacle for every 3lbs sugar. This gives the marmalade an extra kick. Note: this is the only use I have for black treacle, and the tin I am using is now in its third year; i.e. it keeps well.
7. Bring to the boil and when it first boils, give it a stir. Then get a rolling boil until the stuff is setting (use a plate kept in the fridge to test the stuff...when ready it crinkles with pushed wioth the forefinger and, when you lift the finger slowly, the marmalade sticks thickly). This sets fairly quickly: 10-12 mins or thereabouts.
8. Take off the stove and allow to cool for a few minutes. Then stir well to distribute the pieces of peel, at the same time adding a little whisky or dark rum..again, about 2 tablespoons per 3lbs of oranges. This again gives an extra bit of flavour. The alcohol, of course, boils off.
9. Pour this into jars that have been warmed in the oven. Put waxed paper discs on top and seal etc as you wish,
this will keep in a cool, dark place for at least a year.
JohnClayton
It is far better than any that you can buy and is well worth the effort making it, and as a bonus Seville oranges are on sale and can be purchased fairly cheap.
1. Wash your Seville oranges (you need 1lb to make 4-5lbs of the final product) and put them in the deep freeze for at least 24 hours, with one small lemon to every pound of oranges. I use 2lbs in one session, which this week yielded 9½ pounds.
2. Take the oranges that you wish to turn into marmalade, plus the one lemon to one pound of oranges, from the freezer. Let them thaw out completely.
3. Halve the soft fruits and scoop out the seeds,pith etc into some soft cloth (muslin by the book, but a soft thin handkerchief or even a chunk of tights material will do) and knot this so that no puips can escape. I put the cloth on a stainless steel seive and put that over a bowl so no juice is lost.
4. Take the rinds and blitz them in the food precessor with sharp blade attached. The more you blitz, the finer the rind. Its up to you, but I like mine on the chunky side!
5. Put peel, bag of pips etc, and juice into the jam pan and pour in 3 pints water for every 1lbs of oranges + 1 lemon. Bring to the boil and gently simmer until the peel is very soft. I give it an hour (the books says 1½ hours, but that is for peel that has not already been softened in the freezer).
6. Add 3lbs sugar (ordinary jam sugar, without added pectin) for every 3lbs oranges/3 pints water and stir off the heat until all the sugar is dissolved. Then stir in one tablespoon black treacle for every 3lbs sugar. This gives the marmalade an extra kick. Note: this is the only use I have for black treacle, and the tin I am using is now in its third year; i.e. it keeps well.
7. Bring to the boil and when it first boils, give it a stir. Then get a rolling boil until the stuff is setting (use a plate kept in the fridge to test the stuff...when ready it crinkles with pushed wioth the forefinger and, when you lift the finger slowly, the marmalade sticks thickly). This sets fairly quickly: 10-12 mins or thereabouts.
8. Take off the stove and allow to cool for a few minutes. Then stir well to distribute the pieces of peel, at the same time adding a little whisky or dark rum..again, about 2 tablespoons per 3lbs of oranges. This again gives an extra bit of flavour. The alcohol, of course, boils off.
9. Pour this into jars that have been warmed in the oven. Put waxed paper discs on top and seal etc as you wish,
this will keep in a cool, dark place for at least a year.
JohnClayton
