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Apple Jam
Take some good apples; pare and core them, cutting into small pieces, and put in a preserving-pan with enough water to cover them. Boil until they are reduced to a pulp, then pass through a hair-sieve. Use one pound of pulp to every twelve ounces of preserving-sugar, and boil and skim until no more scum arises, and place in pots. When cold, cover with paper and seal with brandy-soaked paper cut to fit the inside of the pots. Tie over with paper in the usual way.
A plain English fruit-cheese method: cook the apples down, sieve, weigh the pulp, sweeten by ratio. Everything depends on knowing what the pulp weighs, so keep the scale out from the start.
- The hinge: weigh the pulpThe sugar is set by the weight of sieved pulp, not by the weight of raw fruit. Sieve first, weigh the purée, then measure 12 oz sugar for every 1 lb of pulp (a 3:4 ratio by weight, noticeably less sugar than a modern equal-weight jam).
- Preserving-sugarThis meant coarse, large-crystal cane sugar, sold because it dissolved with less stirring and threw less scum. Ordinary granulated sugar behaves the same here; no substitution adjustment is needed.
- Hair-sieveA horsehair-mesh sieve, roughly the fineness of a modern tamis. A food mill on its medium plate or a fine stainless sieve gives the same result, and the mill will handle hot pulp faster.
- Choose acid, firm applesBramley, Granny Smith or any tart cooking apple gives both the pectin and the acidity this jam relies on, since no lemon is added. Sweet dessert apples will produce a bland purée that is slow to set.
- Water and reduction"Enough water to cover" is generous; the fruit gives up plenty of its own. Cook covered until collapsing, then leave the lid off after adding sugar so the jam can reduce.
- Judging the setThe original stops at "no more scum arises," which is a cleanliness cue, not a set cue. Boil to 220F (105C), or until a spoonful on a chilled plate wrinkles when pushed.
- SkimmingA small knob of butter stirred in at the end will collapse most of the foam, sparing you repeated skimming and the sugar it carries off.
- The brandy paper and storageRounds of paper dipped in brandy, laid over the jam and tied over with a paper cover were the Victorian defence against surface mould in an unsealed pot; note that this recipe has you cover the pots when cold, not hot. It does not sterilise the jar. Fill sterilised jars, seal with two-piece lids and either water-bath process to a current guide or simply refrigerate and use within a few weeks.
- YieldAbout 4 lb of apples yields roughly 2 lb of sieved pulp; with the sugar that makes somewhere around three to four half-pint jars, depending on how far it is reduced.
Oscar Tschirky's book collects recipes associated with a great New York hotel, and its preserving chapter is frankly English in method: weigh the pulp, set the sugar by ratio, cover with brandied paper and tie over "in the usual way" — a phrase that assumes any reader had watched it done. Apple jam of this kind sits between two familiar things: it is not jelly, since the sieved pulp goes into the pot, and it is not American apple butter, which is cooked far longer, spiced, and darkened by long reduction rather than lifted by a short hard boil with sugar. The brandy-soaked round is the older technology on the page. Before reliable vacuum sealing reached domestic kitchens, spirit-dampened paper laid over the jam was a common guard against mould in an open crock, and it survived in print for decades after screw-top jars had made it unnecessary.