Whisky Grapefruit Marmalade

I confess, I’ve never made jam before. I’ve wanted to, but since my farmer skills are woeful I never seem to have an abundance of fruit with which to crank out a cracking jam.

This weekend I was given a very large quantity of citrus fruit. Lots of different ones!

We’ve got ruby grapefruit, yellow grapefruit, 5 varieties of mandarins, pomelo, oranges, tangelos, Meyer lemons, Lisbon lemons, Tahitian limes and some little wrinkly cumquat.

My whole life I’ve hated grapefruit because I’m so bitter sensitive and I just can’t deal with them. Even with a metic tonne of sugar. Cannot deal.

Upon the assurance that these grapefruit were really different, I decided to have a crack at making a marmalade. I love rinds in anything, so I’m hoping that grapefruit marmalade will we a worthy bridge to enjoying a grapefruit.

Start with the rinds

Give them a big scrub, get any wax off. And any dirty marks too.

Chop your fruit in half and juice them well.

Peel out the pulpy bits and the seeds, and stick them in some cloth. We need these guys later.

Chop the rind into strips. Thin strips, thick strips. Your preference. I did both.

Pop them in a saucepan and cover them with water. You’ll need to boil them forever. Until you can cut through the rinds easily with your wooden spoon.

Mine took 3 long hours. And they are bitter af.

Dump everything else in the pot

So kick in your juice, sugar, pips and pulp.

The quantity of sugar frightened me. It reminded me of when I went to a sausage making class and after I saw the amount of fat that goes into those things I vowed never to eat a sausage again. But I did. Damn I love sausages.

So if you’re trying to get off the sweet stuff then you definitely need to steer clear of jams.

The marmalade set point

Marmalade is a bit of a bastard toward the end. You need it to thicken up and turn into a nice structured paste instead of a runny sauce, and the way to do this is to keep cooking until enough pectin has come out of the pulp, skins and pips.

In my case it didn’t set as there wasn’t enough pectin in the bits I had.

So I added some lemon juice, and seeds as lemon is higher in pectin. And then I was all set. This article is awesome for understanding the setting process.

Lastly… add whisky

You need to do this after your set point and don’t do it while it’s too hot otherwise it will all bubble away.