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Quince Cheese
Boil the quinces, and rub them to a pulp, as in the last recipe. Weigh this pulp and also an equal weight of sugar. Boil the fruit till it is dry; pound the sugar, stir it, and keep stirring over a gentle fire until the jam is stiff and smooth, and so dry that it leaves the sides of the saucepan with a spoon. Spread it out on shallow dishes, or make little paper cases, pour the fruit in to the depth of half an inch, and, if necessary, dry in a cool oven until the fruit is quite stiff. If the cheese has been spread on dishes, cut it into fancy shapes, and store these in a tin box between sheets of writing paper. If paper cases are used they can be taken off easily if they are dipped for a moment in cold water.
A fruit paste, not a dairy cheese: the name refers only to the firm, sliceable block it sets into. The technique is straightforward but demands patience and constant attention at the end.
- "As in the last recipe"The preceding recipe is not reproduced here; the usual method is to simmer the quinces in a little water until completely tender and then press them through a sieve. Skins and cores are rich in pectin, so they are generally left in for the boiling and sieved out afterwards.
- Equal weightsPulp and sugar by weight, one to one, is the classic ratio for a paste that keeps at room temperature. Weigh the pulp after sieving, not the raw fruit.
- "Boil the fruit till it is dry"This means reducing the sieved pulp before the sugar goes in, so the finished paste is not endlessly wet. The recipe gives no timings; it goes by the state of the paste, and a juicier fruit will take considerably longer.
- The hinge: constant stirringOnce thick, quince paste catches and scorches within seconds, and it spits hot enough to burn. Use a heavy pan, a long-handled wooden spoon, and the lowest workable heat; the direction to keep stirring is not optional.
- Knowing when it is doneThe paste should pull away from the sides in a mass, as the recipe says, and hold a channel when you drag the spoon across the bottom. Quince usually darkens as it cooks, often to deep amber or brick red, though the final shade varies with the fruit and the length of cooking.
- "A cool oven"About 200-225F, or an oven that has been switched off after other baking. The aim is to drive off moisture over several hours, not to bake the paste.
- Paper cases and writing paperUse baking parchment or plain unwaxed paper. Modern printed or coated papers are not suitable for direct food contact. The dipping trick described relies on a plain, absorbent paper of the writing-paper sort.
- Yield and servingThe recipe gives no yield; note that an equal weight of sugar is added to the pulp, so the finished paste weighs substantially more than the sieved pulp alone. It keeps for months in a tin in a cool place and is served in thin slices with hard cheese, cold game, or at the end of a meal with nuts.
Quince paste is a very old form of European preserve, and the English word marmalade comes from Portuguese marmelada, from marmelo, quince — the earliest marmalade was a stiff quince block of this kind rather than a citrus spread. High in pectin and hard and astringent raw, the quince suits long cooking with sugar, and versions of the paste are found across the old sugar-preserving world: Spanish membrillo, Portuguese marmelada, French cotignac. Cassell's includes it among the household preserves of the late Victorian kitchen, a period when quince trees were still grown in English gardens. The instruction to cut it into fancy shapes and layer them between sheets of paper recalls the confectioner's tradition, in which such pastes served as dessert-table sweetmeats.