Allotments 4 All

Bought my first 5kg of rather nice Seville oranges off the market this morning at 80p/lb.
Thats my evenings and days off taken care of for a while!!

You cannot beat the taste of making your own, it's such a taste difference to even top end shop bought ones

There was also a 5kg net of beautiful, small pickling onions. Late in the season, I know,but still in very good condition. As I'd sold all my autumn produced ones I bought that and completed them this morning before work. They'll be ready to distribute to the poor and needy next month, (well they'll be relatively poor after paying me for them!!)

Thanks for the marmalade reminder!!

Must remember to buy sevilles - don't know what I would do without my alarm reminder in phone !!

Debs

I saw some at a market stall yesterday and realised it was marmalade time again. I have several years vintages or as my son says aranceages. It gets better as it gets older. Apparently it went down well in Malaysia as a gift when he goes there for Chinese New Year celebrations. I use a pressure cooker for the initial softening then chop them up for the proper boil with sugar. I also heard that the pips aren't that important for the set; the pith is what provides the pectin.

I also do some cooking in the pressure cooker but first of all I cut up the oranges/g'fruit, whatever, and food process.  I also always use all the flesh.  Then I pressure cook it for 10 mins, 10lbs pressure. After that I cook as normal, in a preserving pan with  sugar, until setting. I've used this method for 35 years plus, having first read it in my pressure cooker book.  My parents however always used to sit there cutting the pith up in to thin slices by hand - took ages.  But their marmalade was good too, just different.

Yip I was very pleased when I visited my loca farm shop and found some really lovely Seville oranges.  I made one mistake though and used a couple of boxes of icing sugar I had in the back of my cupboard so although my marmalade tastes lovely - it is not clear like my normal liquid sunshine.  10 bottles of cloudy marmalade in my store cupboard. Yummy

Seville Orange, Whisky, Ginger, and Orange & Blueberry..... completed one brew of each and they're selling fast.

Must get more Sevilles while they're still available!