I had a difficult mathematical calculation for a woman of limited mathematical ability: how to calculate the right ratios for a ‘reduced sugar marmalade’ (without resorting to sugar substitutes) from the existing figures!
I had the specific amounts of ‘sugar to fruit’ from Earlybird, who had success – then googled to see what recipes were out there. Not many. I didn’t have the amount of water I should use. And anyway I had a different weight of oranges than any of the recipes I found!
Anyhoo, maths and estimates done, this is what I came up with:
Reduced Sugar Marmalade
2kg Seville oranges, 4 litres water, 2 lemons, 2.75 kg sugar.
(My original recipe has a ratio of ‘fruit to sugar’ of 1:2: so 2kg of oranges would require 4kg sugar- so the reduction in this recipe is significant)
Half the oranges and squeeze, pull out pulp and pith. Squeeze the lemons.
Put all this juice, pith pips and pulp into a muslin bag suspended over the pan. Juice will run out, into the pan, all other bits retained by bag. Add the lemon husks to the muslin bag.
Slice orange skins into fine pieces ( I put through my old Magimix until quite fine) and add to pan with the water –
Bring to the boil and simmer gently for 2 hours, with the muslin bags suspended in the mixture, until peel is soft.
Lift out the bag containing the pips etc. and squeeze as much as possible back into the pan .
(I lifted out the muslin bag and suspended it over the pan in a sieve and squashed it with the back of a large spoon as it was far too hot to handle. It is important to get this gelatinous substance into the marmalade mix as it has all the pectin, and this is what helps it set.)
Then discard the bag contents.
Add the sugar to the pan. Stir until sugar has dissolved. Bring to the boil and then boil rapidly until setting point has been reached. (Test by putting a small amount onto a cold saucer and pulling a spoon through it. It should wrinkle if it has reached setting point)
While marmalade is getting to this point, warm clean jars in the oven to 110c along with the jam funnel, and metal soup ladle, if you have one, so all super clean!
Boil lids in a pan of water few a few mins. Lift out onto a clean, just ironed tea-towel (ironed = pretty sterilised)
Remove the marmalade pan from the heat and skim to get rid of any scum.
Cool for 5-8 mins then stir to make sure peel is distributed evenly, then fill pots to top,
Seal and when cool, label.
***
Before now I have used preserving sugar, but Tesco only had jam sugar, which has added pectin, which I didn’t feel I needed, so I bought instead Demerara. It has given the marmalade a lovely deep colour.
My interest in lower sugar marmalade is for the diabetics in the family, but the flavour of this is very good and has all the qualities of a great marmalade, even though I say it myself 🙂
I spoke to my Aunt last night who uses her Aga to cook the fruit overnight. But she doesn’t do them whole as here.
She prepares the fruit like I do, but boils the shredded skins without the juice, then once she has bought them to the boil she puts the pan in the bottom oven of the Aga overnight. She only adds the juices for the last few minutes of cooking after the sugar’s added, as she says it gives a fresher flavour. I’m going to take my two types over to her and we are going to have a tasting!
Then I spoke to Ma, who plans to do Aunt’s method, but using her slow cooker overnight instead of Aga!
So many ways to skin a rabbit.
Boadicea's Chariot 
Did it set properly pseu?
I think I would have used the pectin sugar!
Set like a dream, Christina.
Hello Pseu, in my endless quest for intellectual honesty, I went in search of the origins of marmalade. This is what I learned, courtesy of Wikipedia:
“According to the Oxford English Dictionary, “marmalade” appeared in English language in 1480, borrowed from French marmelade which, in turn, came from the Portuguese marmelada. According to José Pedro Machado’s Dicionário Etimológico da Língua Portuguesa, the oldest known document where this Portuguese word is to be found is Gil Vicente’s play Comédia de Rubena, written in 1521:
Temos tanta marmelada
Que minha mãe vai me dar um pouco
In Portuguese, according to the root of the word, which is marmelo, “quince”, marmelada is a preserve made from quinces, quince cheese. Marmelo in turn derives from Latin melimelum, “honey apple”, which in turn comes from the earlier Greek μελίμηλον (melímēlon), from “μέλι” (meli), “honey” + “μήλον” (mēlon), “apple”.”
My mum used to make marmalade from Seville Oranges that she had grown herself*. Living on an isolated farm under a totalitarian regime, ostracised (I always thought that word derived from German for East, but apparently it derives from the word for broken pieces of pottery used as voting tokens by the Greeks. The things you learn, hey!) by the international community and suffering UN sanctions, imported marmalade was virtually impossible to acquire and the local stuff was too sickly sweet. She grew quinces as well, from which she made jelly. I could not stand the stuff, but the marmalade was delicious.
* “she had grown herself”. This is a satirical nod to the evil colonialists of old, who would boast to overseas visitors how they had built their country with their ‘own bare hands’.
Van der Merwe, (the archetypal Boer farmer) goes to London where he sees a 4 men working working on a building site. Shocked, he looks at his host and says,
‘Why are so many men working on this one building?”
His host replies, “There is a lot of work to be done, and it needs to be completed by the end of next week.”
“Agh, you rooineks, you don’t know how to work. Give me 20 natives and I could do the job myself.’
Of course he would not have used the word ‘natives’.
Marvellous stuff about marmalade and related matters, Sipu!
Ma made ‘membrillo’ when she lived in Spain, from quinces she had grown herself ( 🙂 ) – good with real cheese and cold meats –
but I prefer the British marmalade made from Seville oranges. She used to collect dropped oranges for her marmalade and never bought them.