Monday, March 5, 2018

Harvest Monday - March 5th, 2018

 
Not to brag, but the fruit tree varieties at this property are very underwhelming. 

This post is part of Harvest Monday at Our Happy Acres. We finally got a week of winter here so my garden had a rest while I dealt with the 50lbs of kumquats that even the critters aren't interested in eating.

My first marmalade attempt a few weeks ago was both visually disgusting and texturally repulsive.  (Shout out to NYT Cooking for leaving a gap in their paywall so I could access their article on making jam. It was very helpful when I was sending SOS messages into my google search bar.)

Not for human consumption.

The second time around I made some adjustments - like if you smell sugar caramelizing it's a sign that you've cooked it for five minutes too long, not a sign that you need to cook it for 20 more minutes. 


Better.

Acceptable for humans to eat. 
I used this recipe as a rough template and then used a hot water bath at the end. I also threw in a few Criolla Sella peppers. They have an extremely disappointing taste (I got them in a seed swap from someone who had never grown them) but have a fruity, tropical smell that I was into at the moment.



The oranges are sweet, but have poor eating quality, so those were squeezed into yard juice and also sliced really thin for a breakfast salad made with Renee's mesclun mix.



The grapefruit tree produces fruit that smell better than they taste, but it's become an integral component of my Old Fashioned recipe that I originally ripped off from a fantastic bar in Silver Lake and have been perfecting over the years. I sliced them and threw them in the oven on a wire rack for 10-12 hours.







6 comments:

  1. I feel your pain on the marmalade. Last time I tried to make a fruit jam it wound up rubbery and unfit for even the compost pile. I had better luck making Michelle's Pepper Jam (http://fromseedtotablerecipes.blogspot.com/2008/12/pepper-jam.html) which turned out quite well. I also second your thoughts on the Criolla Sella chilis. I grew them a couple of years ago and got lots and lots of fruit, but they were blah to me, also kind of seedy for their size.

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  2. Thumbs up to the drink! I have to admit to never having made marmalade as there is so much chopping involved - unlike jam. I have missed the Seville orange season here in the UK. Blink and it has gone.

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    1. I tried to make myself believe the chopping and deseeding was a meditative activity. Kumquats are approximately 90% seed.

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  3. I love kumquats, but 50 pounds is a LOT to deal with. And I finally came up with something to do with blah peppers - ferment them. It ups the flavor ante and if you dehydrate them it makes for some good pepper flakes.

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    Replies
    1. I'll have to try that. I have a few sad looking pepper plants still limping along.

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