No. 618

Peach or Apple Marmalade

Marmelade de Peches ou de Pommes

Peaches.-Peel and remove the stones from one pound of peaches, cook in a little water, drain and press through a sieve, sweeten with an ounce of brown sugar. These marmalades are for roast meats and poultry.

Apples.-A pound of peeled apples cooked in a little water, pressed through a sieve and sweetened with an ounce of brown sugar.

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For the Modern Kitchen

A pair of unsweetened-by-modern-standards fruit purees meant as a condiment for roast meat, not a preserve for the jar. The whole point is restraint: one ounce of sugar to a pound of fruit is barely two tablespoons.

Do not read "marmalade" as jamRanhofer means a thick fruit puree, closer to applesauce than to a set, spreadable preserve. There is no pectin work, no gel stage, and no long boil.
Sugar quantityAn ounce of brown sugar is about 2 tablespoons packed. Against a pound of fruit this reads as savory rather than sweet, which is deliberate for a sauce served with pork, duck or goose.
"A little water"Roughly a quarter cup for a pound of fruit is enough to keep it from catching before the fruit releases its own juice. Ripe peaches may need almost none; firm apples want the full amount.
SievingA food mill or drum sieve gives the texture intended. A blender or food processor tends to aerate the puree, which can leave it slacker and paler.
Apple choiceUse a variety that breaks down readily, such as McIntosh or Bramley, since the recipe assumes the fruit collapses on cooking. Firm dessert apples will not go smooth without extended cooking.
Peach skinsPeel by dropping the fruit in boiling water for 30 to 45 seconds, then into cold water. Cutting the skin off raw wastes a great deal of flesh.
Yield and keepingA pound of fruit yields roughly a cup and a half, enough for six to eight servings alongside a roast. With this little sugar it is not preserved in any sense; refrigerate and use within about four days.
Serving temperatureIt appears under Cold Sauces, so cool it fully before it goes to table. The flavor tightens and reads less sweet cold than it does warm from the pan.

A Little History

Charles Ranhofer's The Epicurean (1894) records the kitchen of Delmonico's in New York, and its cold sauce chapter is essentially a French sauce repertoire adapted to American service. The French marmelade simply means fruit cooked down to a pulp, without the citrus-and-peel implication the English word acquired. Fruit purees served with roast meat and game are long established in European cooking, and the pairing of apple with pork and goose in particular is old enough that its origins are traditional rather than documented. The peach version belongs to a period when peaches were abundant and cheap in the eastern states during a short summer season, and when a restaurant kitchen would turn out such a sauce fresh rather than reach for a jar.