Pink Grapefruit Marmalade

Why pink grapefruit?  Seville oranges are only in season in January so I hunted out something that would give a similar taste.  Finding something similar to Seville marmalade is important as the BF is a traditionalist and he goes through an 8oz jar per week - 52 jars per year. So unless I spend all of January doing nothing but making marmalade 24/7 he would soon finish eating what I had made. The BF says he can not taste the difference between this and normal Seville orange marmalade.

Pink grapefruit marmalde

Makes about 9 x 8 floz jars

3 large pink or red grapefruit - approx 600ml of juice
2 large lemons - approx 150ml of juice
4 pints of water
2 kg of preserving sugar (or granulated sugar)
1/2 bottle of Certo pectin

Tips:

• Prep everything the day before you want to make the marmalade
• To remove the pith from the peel get your thumb nail under the membrane and peel back - just like peeling a label off a container, but far easier.
• lay your work space out with everything you need on day 2 before turning on the heat - tea towel and kitchen paper laid out ready for the lids and jars later on, plate in the fridge, tools to hand etc....
• Always sterilise more jars/lids than the recipe calls for to be on the safe side
• I recommend wares of knutsford for good quality jars, that have a wide range of lids.
• You do not need to use wax discs if using jars with metal twist top lids

Equipment:

See Page on Preserve making equipment for extensive list.

Directions:
 Day 1:

1. Pour the water into the maslin pan
2. Place the muslin open in the soup bowl
3. Cut all the fruit in half and juice, pouring the juice into the pan with the water. 
4. Place any pips into the muslin bag or square
5. Cut the halves of fruit into half again
6. Peel the membrane from the peel and place in the muslin
7. Tie the muslin bag to the inside of the pan with the fruit membrane and pips submerged in the water and pout in any excess liquid into the pan
8. Using your sharp knife slice all the peel from the grapefruit and lemons into strips 1 - 2 mm wide, try to keep them of even width.
9. Place the strips of peel into the pan and leave to soak for 12 to 24 hours.

Day 2:

1. Place jar lids in saucepan and cover in about 3 - 4 inches of water.  Put on back of hob and slowly bring to boil.
2. Place clean jars onto baking tray, with a gap between each one, and place in oven at 180.
3. Put saucer or small plate in fridge to cool.
4. Place pan on heat and bring to boil.
5. Simmer gently for 2 hours or until a test strip of peel squashes easily between your fingers.
6. You do not want the water level to drop past 2/3rds at this stage, so feel free to top up with fresh water.
7. remove the bag of membrane and place in soup bowl.
8. Add sugar to the pan and stir over a low heat until it is dissolved - this will take a few minutes.   You can hear the sugar grated on the bottom as you stir the spoon around. If you are not sure if it has dissolved then continue stirring for another couple of minutes.
9. Put on the clean rubber gloves and squeeze the muslin bag over the pan.  You will see a cloudy thick liquid come from the bag.  This is the pectin and you want to get as much of this into the pan as you can.  Once done you can discard the membrane and put the muslin aside for washing and reuse.
10. Stir the pectin in the pan.
11. Increase the heat until the mix reaches a fast boil stirring all the time.  
12. As soon at all of the mix is at a fast boil set the timer for 13 minutes.
13. Adjust the heat is required to keep the mix at a fast boil, but not threatening to boil over the top of the pan continue stirring.
14. After 13 minutes pour in Certo or other liquid pectin and continue stirring and boiling for another 2 minutes.
15. At this stage the marmalade should be 220 degrees.
16. Remove pan from the heat and spoon a little onto the cold saucer to test for setting.  Leave for about 1 minute and then push your finger through it to see if it wrinkles.  Wrinkling equals ready.
17. Leave marmalade for about 5 - 10 minutes
18. Drain the lids and place on kitchen paper (bottom side down)
19. Remove the jars from the oven and place on tea towel
20. Skim off any scum using soup spoon
21. Place funnel in top of first jar and ladle in marmalade
22. Hold the jar with the jar wrench and put on lid turning it hand tight
23. Continue using jar wrench and to carry jar to another part of worktop away from your working area.
24. repeat stages 21 - 23 until all the marmalade is in the jars.

This jar is a little misty on the outside as I took it out of the fridge to take this picture

Wait until the contents are perfectly cool before labelling.  if you label when hot or warm the label will either fall off or be a pain to remove when you want to re-use the jar.  Always put the name of the contents and the date they were made on the label.

This marmalade lasts for about 18 months - unopened - if stored in a dark, cool dry place - a larder, garage or dry shed are all perfect.