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Raisin Compote
3 navel oranges 1½ pounds seeded raisins 3 cups sugar 3 pints currants 3 cups cold water Prepare the oranges as for marmalade and let them soak over night in the water. In the morning pick and wash the currants and add them with the washed raisins and sugar to the oranges; boil hard for about two hours and put in glass jars, closing them while hot. Serve with meat. 4 pounds fruit 3 pounds sugar 1 pint vinegar
The text as printed is a casualty of the loose-leaf format: the ingredient list omits the oranges the method depends on, and the last line (4 pounds fruit, 3 pounds sugar, 1 pint vinegar) belongs to a neighboring recipe. Read it as a raisin-currant-orange conserve meant to be spooned alongside roast meat.
- The missing orangesThe method says to prepare the oranges as for marmalade and soak them overnight, but no quantity is given. A few oranges, sliced thin, peel and all, is the likely intent, and the overnight soak is what softens the peel.
- The stray last line"4 pounds fruit, 3 pounds sugar, 1 pint vinegar" does not match the quantities above it and appears to belong to another recipe, most likely a vinegar-based one. Ignore it rather than trying to reconcile it.
- Currants by the pintThree pints is a volume measure; if fresh red currants are meant, a pint runs roughly 12 ounces, so about 2 1/4 pounds of fruit. The recipe does not specify, and dried Zante currants would give a very different result.
- Seeded raisinsThe term meant raisins with the seeds picked or machine-pressed out, often large muscats. Modern seedless raisins are the usual substitute, weight for weight.
- Two hours is too longTwo hours is likely too long -- With this much sugar and the pectin in currants and orange peel, the mixture should reach setting point well before two hours of hard boiling, which risks caramelizing the sugar and toughening the raisins. Cook to about 220F, or until a spoonful sheets and a track drawn across a chilled saucer holds.
- SealingFilling and closing hot jars, with no further processing, was standard open-kettle practice and is why period preserves so often grew a skin of mold. Current practice is to fill clean hot jars, leave 1/4 inch headspace, and process 10 minutes in a boiling water bath; adjust upward for altitude.
- Yield and servingServed cold with roast pork, ham, lamb or game, a tablespoon or two per plate; it is a condiment, not a dessert compote, despite the name.
"Compote" here is used loosely. In French practice it means fruit poached in syrup and eaten as dessert, while this one behaves like a conserve, the family of preserves that combines two or more fruits, often with raisins or nuts, and is set beside meat rather than bread. The instruction "serve with meat" places it in a long line of sweet-sour accompaniments to roasts, alongside spiced currants, damson cheese and vinegar-based fruit relishes.