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The Quince (MARMALADE Nos and Use equal)
QUINCE MARMALADE Nos. 4, 5, 6, and 7 Use equal parts of quince and crabapple, proceeding as in Marmalade No. 2, or substitute for the crab freshened figs, or dates, or pineapple marmalade.
QUINCE MARMALADE No. 8 Lemon or Ginger Make as for Marmalade No. 1, using lemon peel and juice, one lemon to each pint of pulp. Ginger may be added or substituted for the lemon.
These are variation notes rather than a standalone recipe: they assume you have Marmalade Nos. 1 and 2 from the same chapter in front of you, and that you already know how quince behaves. The essentials that carry across all of them are below.
- The base method you are missingNos. 4-7 send you to Marmalade No. 2 and No. 8 to No. 1, neither of which appears on this page. The standard period quince procedure runs: peel, core and slice the fruit, simmer with a little water until soft, press through a sieve or mash to a pulp, then cook with sugar to setting point; the peels and cores can be tied in a muslin bag and cooked with the fruit for extra pectin, then discarded. What Nos. 1 and 2 actually specify cannot be verified from this extract.
- Sugar in proportion to pulpPeriod quince marmalades run at roughly three-quarters to one pound of sugar per pound of prepared pulp. Weigh the pulp after sieving, not the raw fruit, since quince loses a good deal to skin and core.
- "A pint of pulp"Measured by volume, cooked and sieved: about two cups, or roughly a pound. One lemon per pint means peel and juice both, so zest finely and add the juice at the end of cooking so the fresh flavour is not boiled away.
- "Freshened" figs or datesThis means dried fruit soaked in warm water until plump, then drained and chopped. Sugar in the base recipe should be cut back a little to allow for the sweetness the dried fruit brings.
- CrabapplesCrabapples are used here for their acidity and heavy pectin load, not their flavour; they are what makes the set reliable. If you cannot get them, hard underripe cooking apples plus extra lemon juice do the same work.
- Ginger quantitiesThe original gives none. For a pint of pulp, a tablespoon of finely grated fresh ginger, or a two-inch piece of bruised ginger simmered in the pulp and lifted out, gives a clear note without dominating. Crystallised ginger, chopped and stirred in near the end, is another option.
- Setting pointCook to 220F on a sugar thermometer, or until a spoonful wrinkles on a chilled saucer. Quince is so rich in pectin that it can pass from setting to solid quickly; start testing early and stir constantly at the end, as this mixture catches and scorches easily.
- The colourQuince pulp turns from cream to amber, rose or deep ruby the longer it cooks. This is not a fault. If you want the pale version, work fast; for the classic red, hold the simmer longer before adding sugar.
- Jars and keepingThe book assumes hot jars sealed and left in a cool larder. Current practice is to fill sterilised jars to a quarter-inch headspace and process in a boiling water bath for ten minutes for shelf storage; otherwise refrigerate and use within a month. Each pint of pulp, once the sugar is in, yields roughly two to three half-pint jars.
The word marmalade comes to English from the Portuguese marmelada, a stiff paste of quince, from marmelo, the quince itself; the orange version that now monopolises the name is the later meaning. Quince was a preserving cook's staple precisely because it is inedible raw and superb cooked: hard, sour, intensely aromatic, and loaded with pectin and tannin, so it sets firmly with nothing added and takes on a red colour as the long heat works on it. A book that runs to eight numbered quince marmalades, as this one does, reflects a household with more quince than it could use fresh, and one whose answer was to combine it with whatever else was on hand: crabapples, dried figs and dates, pineapple or ginger. The variations are less separate recipes than a list of permissions.