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Damson Cheese
Damsons Sugar Thoroughly clean as many damsons as desired, break the skins with a fork, put into jars to stew in the oven till tender, sprinkling with sugar. When quite soft allow them to cool; then rub through a sieve, and to every pound of fruit add nine ounces of sugar. Put them in the preserving pan--rinsed out with cold water first--and boil until it is set. A few of the kernels blanched and sprinkled in when boiling is an improvement.
Damson cheese is not a cheese but a fruit paste boiled down until it will hold the shape of its mould and slice clean. The recipe assumes you know what "until it is set" looks like, which is the only difficult part.
- Leave out the kernelsDamson stones, like bitter almonds and apricot kernels, contain amygdalin, which releases hydrogen cyanide when the kernel is crushed or chewed. The old books add a few for their almond flavour, but the dose here is unmeasured and there is no reason to take it. A drop of almond extract at the end gives the same note.
- Oven for the first stewingThe book gives no heat; a slow oven of about 275-300F suits "stew in the oven till tender," with the jars covered. Allow roughly 1.5 to 2 hours until the fruit collapses. Use ovenproof jars or a covered casserole; a preserving jar with its lid clamped down will not do.
- Sugar is weighed against the pulpComing as it does straight after the sieving, the nine ounces per pound most likely applies to the sieved pulp rather than the raw fruit, so weigh the puree after sieving. Three pounds of damsons will give roughly two pounds of pulp once stones and skins are out, though yields vary.
- Getting the stones outRubbing hot fruit through a sieve is slow work with a wooden spoon or a ladle. A mouli-legumes on the medium plate does the same job in a few minutes and holds back stones and skin. A food processor will not: it shatters the stones.
- Rinsing the panThe cold-water rinse before the pulp goes in is a long-standing trick said to help against sticking. Use the widest heavy-bottomed pan you have, and a long-handled wooden spoon: thick puree spits hard as it reduces, and it will catch on the base quickly if you stop stirring.
- What "set" means hereNot a jam set. Draw the spoon across the base of the pan; when the track stays clear for a second or two before the paste closes over it, the cheese is done. Expect 45 minutes to well over an hour of steady stirring, and the colour to darken to a deep mahogany.
- Potting and keepingPour into straight-sided moulds, ramekins or small jars brushed with a flavourless oil so the cheese turns out whole. With only nine ounces of sugar to the pound, the keeping depends on how far the paste is reduced as much as on the sugar itself, so keep the pots sealed and cool and refrigerate once opened. Traditionally it is left several months before cutting.
- Yield and servingYields vary with how far it is boiled down; three pounds of damsons will make a couple of pounds or so of finished cheese. It is turned out whole and sliced, and in Britain is eaten with hard cheese, cold roast meat or game rather than as a pudding.
Damsons are the small, sharp, blue-black plums of Prunus domestica subsp. insititia, too astringent to be much good raw and consequently pushed into preserves, gin and paste. "Cheese" in this sense simply means a fruit paste reduced far enough to be turned out of a mould and cut with a knife; the word is used more loosely in lemon cheese, and quince paste appears as membrillo in Spain and as marmelada in Portugal. The style is strongly associated with the West Midlands and Shropshire, where damsons were grown both in orchards and as hedgerow trees, and the fruit is often said to have supplied the dye trade as well as the kitchen. It keeps for months from a single autumn glut with nothing but sugar and patience.