Crab apples jelly

I keep experimenting using the various recipes and techniques, which I learned at the Summer preserves course using the different fruits, which I can get access to from gardens of friends and colleagues.

This time I have got hold of crab apples from the garden of my manager, so here I decided to make a jelly from those.

I decided to cut the entire crab apple into smaller piece as a way of both removing the core of the apple (I dislike the bitterness of apple core) as well as spoiled part of the apple. Do not worry about removing the natural fruit pectin within the apple getting ride of the apple core. The pectin is not located in the apple core, the pectin is located in fruit part of the apple.

I also decided to add in some acidity in form of apple vinegar for two reasons. First reason to get a more fresh taste, which boost the fruit flavour. Second reason a higher acidity level (lower pH) will give a faster and stronger gelling inside the jelly.

If you work with smaller portion of jelly, when you should not stir the jelly during the cooking of the jelly mixture as this can give problems with too many air bobbles in the final jelly.

Any left overs of the crab apples was be used for crab apple aquavit.

Crab apple jelly: 4 glasses per 1 kg crab apple

• 1 kg crab apple - washed and cleaned, the stems and core removed
• 800 ml water
• 100 g sugar per 100 ml juice
• 1/8 teaspoon apple vinegar per 100 ml juice - optional

1. Place the fruit piece  and water in large cooking pan. Bring to the boil. Reduce the heat, and let the fruit simmer gently for 10-20 minutes, until the content becomes pulpy in appearance. 
2. Mash the apple pieces into apple mask structure.
3. Place a jelly bag suspended over a large bowl.
4. Pour the mashed apple/water into the jelly bag.
5. Leave until, the bag has stopped dripping. Alternative night over.
6. Prepared the jelly glasses. I add boiling water to the glasses, while other will heat the glasses in the oven at 120 minutes.
7. Measure the amount of fruit juice and weight out 100 g sugar per 100 ml juice.
8. Optional add in the apple vinegar in form of 1/8 teaspoon per 100 ml juice.
9. Pour the fruit into large cooking pan and heat up the juice to the boil.
10. Add in the (pre-heasted) sugar, Stir until the sugar is dissolved.
11. Bring the jelly mixture to a rolling boil (the jelly mixture has a lot of boiling foam on top).
12. Let it boil for 2 minute as starting point.
13. Test for a set after 2 minutes using the flake test (how the jelly is dripping from the cooking spoon). This is tricky, otherwise set, if the temperature is 104'C.
14. When the the texture is right, remove the cooking pan from the heat. Start right away to remove any scum from the surface of the jelly, using a large metal spoon.
15. Pour the jelly into glass jars, fill the jar to the top. Again remove any scum from the surface using a tea spoon.
16. Seal the jar with a lid.
17. Leave the glass upright and undisturbed to set.
18. Store at ambient temperature.