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Rhubarb Marmalade (1 quart bright red rhubarb)
1 quart bright red rhubarb Yellow rind and pulp six stalks 1½ pounds sugar oranges Boil the ingredients together very slowly until well reduced. The rind of the orange may be grated or cut into shavings and boiled tender before it is added to the other ingredients.
The ingredient list has been scrambled by the original two-column typesetting; read it as roughly a quart of rhubarb cut in short stalks, the yellow rind and pulp of six oranges, and 1½ pounds of sugar. The method itself is sound and needs almost nothing added.
- Reading the garbled listThe line breaks have interleaved two columns. The workable reading is: 1 quart bright red rhubarb cut in stalks, yellow rind and pulp of six oranges, 1½ lb sugar. The "six" belongs with the oranges, not the stalks.
- A quart of rhubarbMeasured by volume, not weight: about 1 to 1¼ lb of trimmed stalks cut into half-inch pieces, loosely filling a quart measure. Red-stalked varieties are specified chiefly for colour; green rhubarb differs little in flavour and gives a duller, browner preserve.
- Sugar ratioThe line prints '½ pounds', with a numeral apparently lost in the typesetting; read as 1½ lb to roughly a pound of rhubarb plus the orange pulp, it is a moderately sweet marmalade by period standards, and modern palates will find it balanced rather than cloying. Reducing the sugar much below this shortens keeping time considerably, since sugar concentration is what preserves it.
- Yellow rind onlyThe instruction is deliberate. Pare or grate only the coloured zest and leave the white pith behind, or the marmalade turns bitter. Six oranges' worth of zest is a lot of surface area, so a vegetable peeler and a sharp knife are faster than a grater.
- Boil the rind firstThe optional step at the end is the one worth taking. Simmer the shredded rind in plain water until it is genuinely tender, 20 to 30 minutes, before it goes in. Once sugar is present the peel stops softening and will stay leathery no matter how long the pan boils.
- "Very slowly until well reduced"Rhubarb sheds a great deal of water and scorches readily. Use a wide heavy pan, stir often as it thickens, and expect 40 minutes to an hour. It is done at about 220F, or when a spoonful chilled on a cold saucer wrinkles when pushed.
- SettingRhubarb is low in pectin; the oranges supply most of it, and the pith and membranes of the pulp supply more than the zest does. If it refuses to set, boil a little harder rather than longer at a simmer.
- Yield and keepingExpect roughly three to four half-pint jars. The book gives no processing instructions. Refrigerate and use within a month, or process filled jars by a current tested water-bath method.
Rhubarb marmalade belongs to the long stretch of the preserving year when nothing else is ready: forced and early-field rhubarb arrived in northern kitchens weeks before the first soft fruit, and imported oranges were still in season and cheap. Pairing the two solved two problems at once, since rhubarb is acidic but almost pectin-free and orange rind and membrane supply the set. The name is used loosely here in the older English sense of a thick fruit conserve rather than strictly a citrus preserve, though the presence of shredded peel keeps it close to the Scottish marmalade tradition. Instructions of this compression — a bare list and two sentences — are common in preserving manuals, which assumed a reader who already knew what a finished preserve looked like in the pan and needed only the proportions.