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Beyond the Lone Islands

http://dawntreader-island2.blogspot.com

Friday, 17 September 2010

Something Smells Good

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Any idea what this is?
You’ll get the answer further down in the post.

Woke up to a rainy day today. The bowl of green tomatoes sat on the breakfast table.

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I decided to weigh them.

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Turned out I had enough for half a batch of green tomato marmalade…  (0,5 kilo)

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I also had a lemon (which the recipe requires.)
So I squeezed the juice out of that, and grated the peel.

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My old recipe uses lots of sugar… 1,5 liter for 1 kilo of tomatoes?! That seemed a bit much…  I checked some other recipes on the internet and decided 4 deciliters was probably enough for my half kilo of tomatoes.

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What I did not have was whole chunks of ginger root (which are supposed to cook with the tomatoes and then picked out before you put the marmalade into jars). I did have ginger powder, though. So I added some of that. I also had cinnamon bark sticks (there’s your answer to the first picture). Cinnamon was not in the recipe, but since I was in experimental mood, why not? If nothing else, it looked nice for the picture!

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Into the pot with the tomatoes, the lemon juice, the grated lemon peel, the ginger, the cinnamon. I also added just a little bit of water because my recipe said so. I should probably have left that out. Especially since I did not have any of that Certo pectin stuff at home either (which helps the marmalade set).

Boil for 20 minutes, then add the sugar.
Let the sugar melt and let it boil again.

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Skim the foam of the surface. (Not that there was much of it. Pour the marmalade into jars. I used four “baby food” size jars.

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And then just hope that it sets! I think this batch got a bit runny, but I’ll no doubt be able to use it anyway.

The balance between sweet and sour (and ginger and cinnamon!) came out quite nice (to my taste).

And the four little jars of marmalade do make it feel more worth while having watered those tomatoes on the balcony all summer… It’s been “ages” since I last made my own marmalade  – well, at least three years, because that’s how long it’s been since I last grew my own tomatoes!

 

 

 

7 comments:

MadSnapper said...

I had not idea you are a cook. this sound delish to me. i knew what the cinamon bark was, not that i cook with it, but because i see it in the stores and love the smell of it. when i saw the first photo i could almost smell it, i was thinking apples and cinnamon, not tomatoes and cinnamon. wish i could taste it. the photos came our really good, those are beautiful home grown tomatoe and to think that you grew them on your little cute deck. you are very talented

ANNA-LYS said...

Hej,
Det där både ser och låter jättegott,
med din fina beskrivning kan jag nästan känna doften i näsborrarna :-)
Men, var får jag tag i gröna tomater?
Har precis flyttat så jag har ingen sådan egen odling. Eller så köper jag bara en burk av dig :-)
Tack för att du delar med dig av dina kokkonster!

Trevlig Helg,
och glöm inte din röst på söndag
(gäller även vid eventuell heshet :-)

Ginny Hartzler said...

I want to see it when you put it on something, and read how it tasted! You have quite a bit of culinary skills!

Graham Edwards said...

Yes. I knew it was cinnamon because I use it a lot. However I've never heard of green tomato marmalade. Green tomato chutney, yes. I live and learn.

Scriptor Senex said...

I guessed it was bark but my cinnamon comes in lttle containers because I'm lazy.

DawnTreader said...

My culinary 'skills' really only consist in being able to read; and sometimes a bit of more or less successful experimenting when finding that I don't have all the required ingredients at home. I very rarely get into projects that take a long time to prepare.

As for the cinnamon, I usually use powder, too... I bought these sticks "for learning purpose" you might say ;) - to check out what the original felt and smelled like. I've also seen them used in flower arrangements, especially for Christmas.

California Girl said...

Those sound delicious. I don't have any green tomatoes as I'm not growing veggies but, maybe next year.

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