Recipe: making marmalade

Making marmalade is a wonderful, slow-living ritual that can be enjoyed in the darker, winter months. Seville oranges are traditionally used to make marmalade which bring a taste of the Mediterranean colour and flavour to your kitchen brightening up the darker days of the English winters. It may seem like a daunting task but the trick is to break it down into stages, take it slow and enjoy the process.

image: unsplash: Rob Wicks

Ingredients & equipment you’ll need,

• 1KG of Seville oranges, wash & scrub them before use

• 2.5 Litres of water

• 2KG of Demerara sugar

• Six jam jars

• One muslin cloth

• String

• Jam Thermometer

Method to follow,

Soak your jam jars in warm, soapy water & then place them into the oven at 100°C (gas mark 4) to dry them. This process will sterilise your jam jars and will prevent the hot marmalade craving the cold jam jar. Boil the metal lids in a small pan of water, do this until you are ready to use them.

Find a heavy-based pain or preserving pan and place the muslin in a sieve over the top of it.

Halve the oranges and squeeze their juice into the muslin lined sieve. After this, cut the oranges again and remove the flesh, pips and membrane, place this into the muslin.

Tie the muslin tightly using the string, place this into the pan.

Using a chopping board, cut the peel into strips - it’s your choice as to how thick or thin you’d like it, just make sure you cut them all consistently so that it cooks evenly.

Add the shedded peel to the pan with the water. Place over a medium-high, heat and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for two hours.

Remove the muslin & set the marmalade to one side to cool completely.

Once your marmalade is cooled, squeeze the liquid from the muslin bag into the marmalade mixture. Return to the heat and bring it to simmer again.

Add the sugar - please be careful at this point, the liquid may bubble up considerably so add the sugar slowly. Continue to simmer the marmalade, stirring it regularly until the sugar is dissolved.

Increase the heat again and boil rapidly until the marmalade reaches 104 °C on your jam thermometer.

Once it’s ready, turn off the heat and let it sit for around 20 minutes to let the peel settle. Spoon the marmalade into your jam jars and carefully put the lids on when everything is still warm.

Your marmalade will keep well in a cool, dark place for a couple of years if you sterilise the jars. Once you open the jars, store the marmalade in the fridge and eat within six months.

I hope you manage to carve out a wonderfully slow afternoon for yourself to make this wonderful Imbolc recipe…