Pages

January 18, 2010

The Challenge? Citrus.... My Answer? Clementine Marmalade!!


Who can resist one of these juicy clementines especially in the cold weather of January?! I've made plenty of jellies & jams, but I've never tried to make marmalade. Originally I was hoping to try something with grapefruit or lemons....  and I still may, but marmalade piqued my curiousity!
After looking through many recipes, I decided to try one
 that I found at
Recipe Gold Mine, it goes as follows:

Peel 8-10 clementines. Remove seeds & white membrane
 from the peeled fruit.
Dice the fruit and slice the peel into thin strips.


CLEMENTINE MARMALADE

2 cups thin strips of clementine peel
4 cups cold water
8-10 clementines (pulp & juice)
1/3 cup lemon juice (1 lge. lemon)
2 cups boiling water
3 cups granulated sugar

In a heavy saucepan, combine clementine peel & cold water. Bring to a simmer, covered & over moderate heat. Continue to simmer until peel is tender, approx. 30-45 minutes. Drain thoroughly.
     
Combine the cooked peel, diced fruit, lemon juice and boiling water.
Add sugar and mix thoroughly.
Quickly bring to a boil and cook until mixture is thick and reaches 220 degrees F on a
candy thermometer. The recipe said it should take 20 minutes, but it took much longer than that!

Remove from heat, skim off any foam and ladle into hot sterilized 1/2 pint jars, filling to within 1/2 inch from the top. Seal & process in a boiling bath for 5 minutes.

Voila! 4 jelly jars of Clementine Marmalade!
Not too sure that this will ever become my favorite
 thing to have on an English muffin, but I'll keep trying!

One thing I would do differently; instead of boiling the peelings for 30-45 minutes and then starting the rest of the recipe, I would drain and repeat this procedure another two times. I read a bit on how 'candied' grapefruits & oranges are made. Part of the directions are to boil, drain & boil again the peelings to soften the peel & flavor. I wonder if this would soften the flavor of marmalade which may make it more appealing to me. I can't wait for my dad to try my new creation... he loves marmalade!
 In his opinion, the old English marmalades are the best!

14 comments:

Kim said...

looks so good - I'll have to try that next box of clemintines

Kiyi Kiyi said...

Mmmm I love the color of your marmalade!
I used some clementines in mine too, but I don't think I'll ever use them again - they tasted bitter.
Beautiful marmalade!

Anonymous said...

I absolutely LOVE clementines. Hold on a sec - I have to go get some from the kitchen ;-). The color of your marmalade is gorgeous. I posted about my citrus marmalade here: http://ap269.wordpress.com/2010/01/18/tigress-can-jam-1-citrus-citrus-marmalade/

Anonymous said...

hey, can jam friend. i think this looks delicious. i might be one of the weird ones that like the bitterness. vanilla in mine seemed to have rounded it out. thanks for sharing!

Cynthia said...

Hi! Love your blog, my canning sister. Looking forward to next month's challenge.

michelle5959 said...

Well, I'm not much for canning or Marmalade but it LOOKS delicious! Thanks for sharing!

Julia said...

I love clementine marmalade! Nice work!

Anonymous said...

I have seen a good number of recipes that call for soaking the chopped up fruit overnight in the 'fridge. I think it accomplishes the same softening process that the multiple changes of water does.

Looks delicious.

RJ Flamingo said...

Love clementines & used some in one of my marmalades for the Can Jam (I made 2 - yes, I'm obsessive).

I'm a little concerned about the bitterness in my grapefruit marm, but I think I found the solution to the bitterness in my second (4-1/4 Fruit marmalade) - the addition of 1/8 tsp. of baking soda. The second one had absolutely no trace of bitterness!

I love the color of yours - amazing!

Tom said...

One suggetion to cut the bitterness and make a very orange-orange marmelade is to zest half the clementines (with a microplane, leaving the white pith out), and simply juice the rest. You might have to add a touch of lemon juice for acidity and some commercial pectin, but it will set and not be bitter. :)

Melanie said...

Thanks for the tips!! I had planned on making more and had a nice big bag of oranges to use this time... but the kids got to them and I only have 2 left! :)
Oh well...

Libby said...

Your marmalade looks good and your pictures are very nice. You captured the beautiful clementine color perfectly.

Anonymous said...

very useful post. I would love to follow you on twitter.

Anonymous said...

Your marmalade looks great but does it thicken without using fruit pectin. I have luck using the powder pectin but my jam never thickens when I use the Certo Liquid Pectin.