Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cook Time: 20 minutes
Ingredients:
- 2 pounds (900 g) apples or quinces
- 2 1/2 cups sugar
Preparation:
There is a degree of uncertainty about the fruit involved -- though the word cotogna translates as quince according to most Italian English dictionaries, in Tuscany, where Artusi lived much of his life, it's applied to an extremely flavorful heirloom variety of apple with wrinkled yellow skins, and also to horrid looking but very tasty late-harvested peaches with wrinkled, mottled yellow skins whose flesh clings tightly to the stones. I have never seen quinces in Tuscany. This said, Artusi says:"Mothers should appreciate fruit preserves, if for no other reason because a piece of bread spread with them can sometimes satisfy the sweet tooth of their children.
"Some suggest that be cooked with their skins to preserve their aroma, but I find this unnecessary. Cotogne are inordinately blessed with aroma, and peeling the fruit first saves one from the bother of having to use a food mill later.
2 pounds peeled, cored apples
2 1/2 cups sugar
"Melt the sugar on the fire with a half cup of water, let the syrup come to a boil, and set it aside. Cut the apples into very fine slices and set them to cook in a copper pot with a bit of water. Keep the fruit covered, but stir it frequently, mashing it as best you can with your spoon. When the apples are cooked to the point of being tender, pour the syrup over them and continue cooking, uncovered, until it begins to fall in ribbons from the spoon."
Artusi sometimes stops when he figures his readers will know what to do next, and I thus continue: At this point you should transfer the preserves to jars. Use modern canning jars with metal lids, washing them if need be with boiling water to make sure they are sterile. Pour the hot jam into them, leaving a little bit of air space, and screw the lids on tightly. Let the jars cool on a metal rack. When they have cooled, tap the lids lightly with a spoon or knife; if they ring the seal is true. Should the lid of a jar fail to ring, either reseal it or use it (you could, for example, make a crostata). Store the canned jam in a cool dry place.
Yield: Several jars quince or apple marmalade.
