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Apple or Blackberry Jelly
Prepare nice, tart, juicy apples as in general directions, using three quarters of a pint of sugar to a pint of juice. Prepare blackberry jelly according to general directions for berries.
Two jellies compressed into two sentences, both of which lean on the book's "general directions" printed earlier in the section. Here is what those directions assumed, and where modern practice differs.
- The missing methodApple jelly directions of this period typically mean quartering the fruit (often unpeeled and uncored), barely covering with water, simmering until soft, then draining through a jelly bag without pressing. Squeezing the bag gives more juice and a cloudy jelly. Berries are crushed and heated gently to release juice, then drained the same way.
- Three quarters of a pint of sugarSugar was measured by volume in this book, not weight. Three quarters of a pint to a pint of juice works out to about 1 1/2 cups sugar per 2 cups juice, roughly 11 oz sugar to 1 lb juice. That is a lower sugar ratio than most modern jelly recipes.
- Why underripe and tartThere is no added pectin here. Firm, tart apples carry enough natural pectin and acid to set on their own; windfalls and crab apples are ideal. Fully ripe fruit has begun converting its pectin and will give you syrup.
- Blackberries need helpBlackberries are only moderately pectin-rich, and ripe ones can be short of both pectin and acid. A common remedy was to include a proportion of underripe berries, or to add a little lemon juice, on the order of a tablespoon per pint of juice. Without it a blackberry jelly at this sugar ratio may stay loose.
- Judging the setPeriod directions rely on a hand test, such as a cold saucer or sheeting from the spoon. A thermometer is faster: jelly sets at about 220F at sea level, or 8F above the boiling point of water where you are. Boil hard and uncovered, and skim.
- SealingNineteenth-century jelly was poured into glasses and sealed with paraffin wax, which is no longer recommended because the seal can fail and mould can grow beneath it. Use standard canning jars and a boiling-water bath, or treat the jelly as a refrigerator preserve and keep it cold.
- YieldReckon on about 1 cup of juice per pound of prepared apples, and roughly a pint of finished jelly from every 2 to 2 1/2 cups of juice once it has boiled down.
Buckeye Cookery came out of Ohio in 1877, compiled from contributions by local churchwomen, and its jelly chapter is written the way an experienced cook talks to another: the long explanation is given once under "general directions" and every subsequent entry is a variation on it. Apple jelly was a mainstay of the American farm pantry, made from the tart, hard varieties and often from the peels and cores left over from apple butter and cider, because apples are among the few fruits reliably able to set without help. Commercial pectin did not reach home kitchens until the 1910s, so a cook of this period knew fruit by its setting power. The pairing of apple with blackberry found in other older books rests on the same logic: the apple supplies the pectin the berry lacks, and the berry supplies colour and flavour.