Jammy

[desperance]

So yesterday's melon & star anise jam didn't set; which didn't surprise me much, to be honest, I was fairly sure already that I bottled, as it were, and bottled it too soon.

The swift purchase of a sugar thermometer and some vigorous boiling later, I have made two discoveries:

one, that if you boil it up to the recommended temperature, then yup, it does indeed set;

and two, that the setting-temperature of melon jam is also exactly the burning-temperature of same.

Maybe I gave it just a minute too long, in a determined effort not to repeat the mistake of yesterday.

Anyway, I've decided to call it caramelised (you'd fall for that, wouldn't you?), and we'll see what it tastes like when it's cold.

I am in learning-curve land, and that's fine. What shall I make tomorrow?

Comments

[samarcand.livejournal.com]

My default response to that question tends to be 'Big Squidgy Chocolate Cakes' but that's not really a jam and/or chutney, is it? BSCC chutney?

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Also, of course, chocolate cake doesn't keep. In any sense.

Chocolate chutney? What would you eat it with? (A big spoon, obviously - but what else?) I'm thinking, chocolate and spices and fruit, that works for me; it just needs an excuse of some kind...

[the-acrobat.livejournal.com]

Your melon & star anise jam sounds delicious, so if it is alright cold, pass along the recipe? I'd love to give it a try.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

I'm fairly sure any not-all-rightness is my own fault rather than the recipe's, so this is how it works:

Peel and deseed two melons (they recommend charentais or canteloupe; I used two different varieties of the sweet & perfumed kind). Chop the flesh into smallish chunks, and layer with a pound of sugar in a non-metallic bowl. Mix it all thoroughly, cover with clingfilm and leave it overnight to release the juices.

Next day, tip it all into a large saucepan with two star anise, four finely-chopped pieces of stem ginger without their syrup, and the finely-grated rind and juice of two lemons.

Bring to the boil - and here the recipe says 'turn the heat down and simmer for 25 minutes, until the setting-point is reached', and I did that and it clearly wasn't, so I simmered for another twenty minutes and went for it anyway, which was clearly a mistake. Today I flung out any notion of simmering and boiled vigorously until we finally got there. (To test: spoon a small amount of juice onto a chilled plate, let it cool for a minute and poke it with a finger; if the surface wrinkles, it's ready. Apparently.)

Bottle in hot sterilised jars.

[gauroth.livejournal.com]

oo, another extraneous comment from me - Delia's recipe for slow-cooked marmalade turned out for me just like that (ie not setting) so I used the well-known cook's emergency method ('Sod it! Let's boil it!) and it worked a treat.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

PS - also, I popped a whole star anise into each of the finished jars, just for pretty. No idea how much flavour would leak out, over time; I'm not anticipating time, in this instance...

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Melon and star anise jam?

Why, oh why, must you live across the ocean?

[desperance.livejournal.com]

I'm so sorry. (I wonder if it's legal to send preserves in the mail...?)

[gauroth.livejournal.com]

Oh, I do so sympathise about the jam! Except that my bugbear is fudge: just as I get it to setting-point it scorches into threads of burnt caramel. (Scorchio!) The only kind that works proper for me is when I add chocolate and walnuts: then the fudge goes very dry and crumbly.

I hope your jam hasn't gone dry and crumbly. That rather misses the point, I suspect.....

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Chocolate fudge is about the only thing with either of those two constituents that I don't really like, just because as you say it tends to the dry & crumbly, which takes away something of the point of both.

When I was a boy, I could make perfect fudge. Now I have grown to man's estate, I can't make it work. Same recipe, same classic ingredients; something just goes wrong. Personally, I think it's because I don't sit read comics while the sugar dissolves...