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Barberry Jam
Take equal quantities of barberries and good finely-pounded sugar; heat gently and boil together ten minutes. Take off the scum, put the jam into pots, tying down with thick paper. Probable cost of barberries, from 4d. to 5d. per pint.
A two-ingredient preserve that works because barberries are exceptionally acidic and rich in pectin. The only real difficulty now is getting the fruit.
- Equal quantities means by weightEqual quantities is best read as by weight -- Match the sugar to the prepared fruit pound for pound rather than by volume; a pint of loose berries weighs far less than a pint of sugar. "Finely-pounded sugar" corresponds to granulated or caster sugar today; sugar of the period came in hard loaves and had to be broken and pounded before use.
- Sourcing the fruitEuropean barberry (Berberis vulgaris) is rare in shops and was actively eradicated across much of North America. Fresh fruit comes from hedges and specialist growers; dried Iranian barberries (zereshk) are widely sold but need soaking and will not behave like fresh fruit in a ten-minute boil.
- Prepare before weighingStrip the berries from their stalks and pick out leaves and grit. Many old barberry preserves also called for the seeds to be removed or the pulp sieved — left in, they are noticeable in the finished jam.
- Ten minutes is plausible hereUnusually short for a jam, but the fruit's high acid and pectin bring it to setting point fast. Confirm with the cold-plate test or a thermometer at 220F/104C rather than trusting the clock.
- Sugar dissolves first, then boil hardWarm gently and stir until no grains remain on the back of the spoon, then bring to a full rolling boil for the timed period. Sugar still undissolved when boiling starts will crystallise in the pot.
- Covering the potsThick paper tied over the rim, sometimes brushed with brandy, was the standard Victorian seal and relies on the sugar concentration alone. Use hot sterilised jars with proper lids, filled to within a quarter inch of the top and sealed while hot.
- Yield and useExpect roughly 1 lb 8 oz of jam per pound of fruit and pound of sugar. The result is sharp rather than sweet, and traditionally went with mutton and game as much as with bread.
Barberries were a standard hedgerow crop in British kitchens well into the nineteenth century, valued less as dessert fruit than as a sharp accent: the berries were pickled, candied in bunches to garnish sweet dishes, and boiled into a bright red jelly or jam eaten with meat. Cassell's quotes a price per pint rather than per pound, which suggests fruit that reached town markets in small measures, gathered rather than farmed. The plant's later disappearance from cultivation had several causes: Berberis vulgaris is an alternate host for wheat stem rust, and campaigns to grub it out of farming districts, most systematically in the United States from the early twentieth century, drove it out of the ordinary cook's reach, though in Britain changing tastes and the loss of hedgerows are likely to have mattered as much. The same fruit survives in Iranian cooking as zereshk, scattered through rice, which is where most readers will meet it now.