Miscellaneous Monday

Know what's frustrating?

Writing a decent-length blog post about All The Shit I've Done With Apples just now, and then having it not save in spite of having deliberately hit the 'save' button multiple times.

Urgh.

Anyway, I've done A Lot of Shit With Apples in the past week or so.  This much of it, in fact:

Which is a lot.  11L of apple cider/juice (two of them with cranberry in), 2.5L cranberry-apple jelly, 1.25L regular apple jelly, 57 cups cut up for pie/jelly/applesauce in the freezer, 6L of applesauce (7, if you count the jar we've already eaten), 1.25L apple-blueberry jam...and a couple randoms of cherry jam and blueberry-raspberry from earlier in August.

But yeah...had a big long post...

Bah.

Anyway, here is my cranberry-apple jelly recipe, because it's fantastic and I want you guys to have a go (if you're inclined):

Things you'll need:

• A lot of apples
• A lot of cranberries
• Water
• A Big-ass Pot
• Time
• Pectin
• Canning jars with lids and those ring things
• Sugar
• A lemon or two 
• A waterbath canner
• Cheesecloth
• Colander/strainer

1. Chop up a fucktonne of apples.  The whole thing, stems, cores, seeds and all are going in the pot.
2. Dump in a load of cranberries.  For this last lot, I did roughly 8 cups of apples to 4 cups of cranberries...seems to have worked.  The cranberries were frozen, but there's no reason you can't use fresh either.
   
3. Cover with water, and dump in some spices.  Cinnamon works, though I also put in a few chunks of ginger, and a bit of nutmeg.  Also thyme and rosemary work nicely.
4. Boil this shit on low heat.  This is where the Time part comes in.  It's got to boil until everything is soft and mushy and weird looking.
5. Line a colander/strainer with cheesecloth.  Put the strainer over another big pot/bowl.  Make sure all the holes are covered with the cloth.
6. Spoon/dump the boiled mess of nonsense into the cheesecloth strainer thing.  Take your time with this, you don't want it going directly into the pot.  You're going to want to squeeze it....don't.  If you want clear jelly, don't touch it!  Should look something like this:

   

   Not the cranberry stuff from above, but you get the idea

7. Let gravity do its thing.  This bit takes a while, since you've got to let it drip bare minimum overnight.  You want to get as much as that sweet juice out of there as you can - without any of the chunks.  Eventually, you'll get this stuff:
   
8. Now that the juice has been separated, measure out 4 cups of it into another pot.  Add a package of pectin and juice in about half a lemon.  Boil this - slowly! - until stirring it doesn't disrupt the boil.
9. When that's done, add the sugar.  I do 3 cups of sugar to 4 cups of fruit/juice.  Stir this in and let it boil again - but keep your eye on it.  Definitely prone to over boiling.
10. Now's the fun part.  Sterilize the jars in the waterbath/dishwasher, and get them nice and hot.  Use a funnel to get everything in (less spilling), with a bit of space at the top.  You should be able to just peel off the foam once everything's in.
    
11. Slap the lids down, put the rings on, and dunk it all back into the water bath.  Boil for your altitude (usually about 15mins or so, but look this up), and then let them cool on a dish cloth somewhere out of the way.
12. Make sure you test the seals.  Bad seals = death.  The remaining juice can be either processed into more jelly (following the same steps above...don't try doubling up on the batches, for whatever reason it never works out right), or jarred as cider/juice (same method as above), or you can add some sugar and water and make proper juice out of it, your choice.
13. Enjoy!
    
    
    
    
    

And there you have it!  If you want the golden stuff on the right, don't put cranberries in.  If you want different fruit in there, go for it!  All the heavy chunks can go in the compost and return to the earth, the jars are reusable (not the lids), and the stuff is fantastic.

...and now back to writing my WIP.

Largely unimpressed Cat Tax