Recipe: Making Marmalade - How do you?

Mid January is peak marmalade season here. It's lovely to have a reason to hug the stove at this time of year. Marmalade is something that my Gran used to make, although my Mum wasn't so fond, so it's just in the last 15 years I've become practiced at it.
I like a thin shred jelly marmalade, so my method is a little fussy, but makes a good tangy marmalade which my husband also appreciates.
The marmalade oranges we get come from Spain - bitter oranges that are only available at this time of year and are far too sharp to eat out of hand, but are ideal for marmalade.
This method is for about 5 pounds (2 ½ kg) of oranges. The first step is to peel off some of the unmarked skin to make the shred. I usually find less than half is required, and I cut it into fine shreds. These go in a saucepan with enough water to float them, and are brought to the boil and simmered until soft.


Then the rest of the oranges, peel, pips and all are roughly chopped and put in a large preserving pan with again enough water to float. This year I made a small change and left the pulp in water overnight – the pectin is supposed to be extracted from the pips better that way.
Again the next day the pan is brought to the boil and boiled until the fruit is really soft. I test by cutting through the peel with a wooden spoon.


The pulp is strained in a jelly bag for 20 minutes, then it is returned to the pan with 2 pints of water and reboiled for 20 minutes, then strained again overnight.

All the juice and the peel is put into a cleaned preserving pan again and brought to a simmer. I’ve found if you add the sugar when the liquid is cold it can sometimes start gelling prematurely and spoil the set. I add 1.5kg of granulated sugar per litre of hot juice (1 lb per pint (UK)) and stir till dissolved. Then bring it back to the boil and boil until a set is reached. Sometimes this is very quick, but you want a good set for marmalade.

Whilst the final mix is coming to the boil, I sterilise the jars and lids I am using in my bottom oven.
I used to cover my jams and marmalade with waxed paper circles, but I’ve stopped doing that and am getting fewer issues with keeping now. So I leave the marmalade for about ten minutes to help distribute the peel, then whilst it is still hot fill the jars and seal them. After the jars have cooled they are labelled with the date made.

I'm looking forwards to hearing your variations on making marmalade!

(edited to correct sugar quantity : 1lb per pint would be Jam fruit ratio)

As suggested in this thread you can make marmalade using mainly the skins off citrus fruit used in other ways. Note this is not one I've tried yet, but the recipe came from the Farmhouse kitchen books which I love.

Very Economical Marmalade:
450g/1lb Seville oranges
450g/1lb peel from sweet oranges and grapefruit
The peel can be frozen at any time of year until enough is collected to make marmalade or until seville season returns.

The basic method they give is slightly different to mine so I will put that here too:

Cut each fruit in two, squeeze out all pips and put in piece of muslin tied with a long string.
put water (2.3l 4ptUK) in preserving pan add bag of pips tied to pan handle.
Put orange halves and skins through mincer into pan, and leave overnight.
Simmer with lid on for 15 mins then remove lid and simmer uncovered for 1 hour to reduce liquid by about half.
Add warmed sugar (1.8kg/4lb) Stir well to dissolve sugar then turn up heat to bring to a fast rolling boil with lid off. Stir occassionally.
After 10-15 mions test for a set and when setting point is reached remove pip bag. Remove pan from heat add butter to disperse jam

(aside note: As I often gift preserves to a vegan friend  I never add butter to them, and it doesn't seem to make any difference)

Stir again.
Let stand for about 5 mins to cool slightly, stir to redistribute peel, then pour into warmed jars.

I imagine that you could do quite a nice lemon marmalade using this recipe. Lemons have quite as much pectin as seville oranges I believe, so it ought to work well.

I use a pressure cooker to soften the peel and cut down the cooking time..

For each kilo of fruit, 1 kg sugar and 1 litre of water. My husband prefers a fine shred jelly marmalade. Top and tail the oranges, cut into 1/4's or 1/6's depending on the size of the fruit. Cut the pulp out with a paring knife and put into a food processor with the tops and tails. Cut the peel into fine shreds and place into the pressure cooker.

If you prefer a chunky marmalade, just cut the oranges in half, squeeze out the juice, scoop out all the pith and pips and put them into a muslin bag, slice the peel and put the lot into the pressure cooker.

Put the processed pulp into a muslin bag with the peel, add water. Bring to pressure and cook for 20 minutes. Cool, suspend the bag for a few hours and scrape off any liquid from outside the bag.

Transfer contents to a preserving pan, bring to boil and add sugar. Hard boil for 15 minutes (I use the flake test to check for setting point). Pour into heated jars right to the top and turn upside down for 10 mins to evenly distribute the peel and stop it from floating to the top.

I don't pressure can or waterbath the finished jars either. They keep fine and have even found a 4 year old jar tucked at the back of a cupboard that still tasted good but had darkened so used it in a christmas cake. That turned out so well, a jar of marmalade is now a standard ingredient in my Christmas cakes.

The marmalade season starts in August in the southern hemisphere and I get the oranges posted direct to me from a grower Auckland in the north island.

When we lived in the UK, hubby used to get up at 4am to drive me to New Covent garden market and we would buy a 20kg crate of oranges. He manages to get through a jar every couple of weeks so I usually buy twice that quantity of oranges to ensure that I have enough to give away to family and friends

I also zest the peel of the tops and tails with a microplane and dehydrate the zest to add to baking and savoury dishes, especially chili con carne.

Have either of you ever tried it with blood oranges or other citrus?

I've made grapefruit marmalade.

We don't eat the grapefruit marmalade because grapefruit can interfere with some medications - Michael had a double bypass a few years ago.

I did try with sweet oranges and lemons when I couldn't get any Seville oranges but found that the pith stays white and doesn't become translucent when cooked. Not a biggy but just didn't look right!

I always do Seville orange marmalade. If one had a good supply of other citrus then it would make sense to try them, but here they are all imported, so the Seville oranges are the only ones that are usually cheap enough. I believe that the UK uses most of these oranges and that they are grown specifically for export to us.
I have thought about growing Poncirus Japanese bitter orange (Citrus trifoliata), since that is reputed to be hardy in Britain. The fruit is not much good except for flavouring and marmalade making.

What I do do, is make a few different batches with different flavourings. My favourite so far is a 'mulled Xmas' marmalade using mulled wine spices like cinnamon and cloves when I'm cooking the oranges up. Ginger root (with the addition of crystalised ginger) is another. Spiritous liquors can be added at the last minute before putting in jars - whisky of course, but the one I made with brandy was rather good too! I even made a orange and cranberry marmalade one year that was rather good, but have been better at estimating how many fresh cranberries I'm going to sell in the shop since then.

i have a blood orange tree, but haven't made marmalade yet-- it's young and the few oranges it's yielding go straight into my mouth!

i've used bitter oranges and a mix of a mandarin/lime cross too.

I've had a couple failures, though, also, which hold me back from making more marmelade. so a few questions, master marmeladers?

- some people remove pith, others don't. Is it necessary? my favorite kind is the "slice the whole orange" type, does that work well enough?
- the last failure, it just didn't jell up, i cooked it for hours til it eventually became hard candy (we ate the hard candy, lol). the recipe was "boil til it jells on a cold plate" but it just never did. If I use a 1:1:1 recipe like the one mentioned above, is there a basic time estimate? two hours? six hours? it's about time to start again here, and I do want to try again.

Hello Tereza, the pectin is in the pith and the seeds, so ensure that you include the seeds when you make your marmalade, they can be placed in a small piece of muslin and tied up.

Removing the pith from the finished marmalade when not using seville oranges may be recommended by some jam makers because the pith doesn't go translucent when cooked but it still needs to be cooked with the peel and pulp just put it with the seeds when boiling everything up.

I have always used a pressure cooker to start my marmalade because it reduces the time to soften the peels.

The open pan method of boiling the peel to soften it means that the liquid reduces while its boiling.

Using a pressure cooker, very little water evaporates (if any) and eliminates the guesswork of how much liquid remains when the peel is fully softened.

I prefer a sharp marmalade and the 1:1:1 ratio still has enough sugar for a good set. The timings are consistent, even at 300m above sea level!

The only variable might be the fruit that you are using if they aren't sevilles.

The prep time for slicing the peel takes the longest, otherwise it is bring to pressure and boil 20 mins, allow to cool at room temperature, strain/drip a few hours and bring to boil in an open preserving pan, add sugar, stir to thoroughly dissolve, set time for 15 minutes, test maybe a boil another 5 minutes if not set but seldom longer than 20 minutes total.

Instead of the flake test, I can usually tell if the marmalade will set by allowing it to drip off the edge of my wooden spoon. If it suspends as a drop on the edge it is ready.

Ladle into warm jars.

I never make batches greater than 1.5kg fruit, same with jams as that does affect the boiling time needed for a good set.

Hope your next batch of marmalade is successful.

thanks a million, Megan. I will definitely be trying again next time I see oranges on sale. Right now we're in tangerine season, which means oranges are close behind.

the variable indeed is the fruit. We have oranges, no idea what kind they are (eating oranges?), we most definitely do not have seville oranges. I will often throw a lemon or our local lemon equivalent (these guys https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rangpur_(fruit) ) in to give it a bit more of a sour taste.

The rangpur sounds as though it would make an excellent marmalade on its own, have you ever tried using it? Might be worth making a 1kg test batch and even if you don't like it as a spread, it could still be used an an ingredient in a rich fruit cake.

Will try to find my Christmas cake recipe and post it in my favourite baking recipes thread.

Marmalade is also good in bread and butter pudding and in cheesecakes, there are lots of ways to use it up!  

I haven't tried but I've thought the same thing. But like tangerines, their skin is very thin and there's little pith, so I'm not sure it would jell up?
Christmas cake recipe would be fabulous, I've not made one in years and it's overdue.

The acidity of your rangpur limes out to be more than enough for a good set.

If the worst come to worst, you will have a syrup that can be diluted for a refreshing drink.

The ratio of sugar could also be increased to 1.5:1:1 but I'd try with the 1:1:1 and if it's too sharp, make another batch adding a couple of jars of the previous batch back into the new one once the sugar has been added an everything is boiling.

Please remember to post some photos to let us know how your rangpur lime marmalade turns out.

I did it this weekend! Your instructions were fabulous and it was sooooo much easier than any other marmalade I've ever made. And it did indeed firm up very nicely, with nothing finicky.

Alas, it is so bitter as to be inedible. I gave some to an English friend of mine who said it was even too bitter for him. I am a person who enjoys eating bitter greens and bitter melon, but even I can't eat it. I've been told to try it with salt and with butter but so far nothing cuts the bitter enough to make it edible.
Luckily the recipe was small, I'm only out 1.5 kg of sugar (got the fruit for free) and my time. But boooo, I was hoping for marmalade!

So if I want to try again with maybe half normal oranges and half rangpur, do I understand it is the acidity that makes it set up?

I'll preface my version by saying that we are Canadian, and marmalade was an occasional item that pretty much only my father liked. We had bought him some of a Scottish brand that had some added scotch in it and he really liked it, so my first attempt was to just make some for him.

2 years ago, we scored some super cheap oranges. They were small, so a high ratio of peel to flesh, a bit dry and not super sweet. At 10 cents each however, it seemed worthwhile to try an make some marmalade!
I used this recipe The Rustic Elk   as my base guide, found through Pinterest.
I didn't do their exact method but instead, scrubbed the oranges and then used a vegetable peeler to take off the peel without the pith. The peel was then covered in water and heated to a soft boil for 1-2 mins and then drained and rinsed. Then it was chopped up. The bodies of the oranges had the pithy outsides cut off and then they were chopped up and added to blanched peel. ( any seeds were also removed)
1/2 cup of the water was replaced by a slightly smokey scotch and it was all cooked on low until it tested as thickened on a chilled plate. Then it was packed in sterilized jars.

The result is a marmalade we all love! Tasty, with bitter edge that doesn't overpower. It works great in baking too. It's easy and cheap enough that it's now on the list for being made every year, once the cheap fall citrus shows up. ( we did throw a lemon in one batch as well and it helped the bitterness and depth of flavour a bit, I think.)

Tereza Okava wrote:I did it this weekend! Your instructions were fabulous and it was sooooo much easier than any other marmalade I've ever made. And it did indeed firm up very nicely, with nothing finicky.

Alas, it is so bitter as to be inedible. I gave some to an English friend of mine who said it was even too bitter for him. I am a person who enjoys eating bitter greens and bitter melon, but even I can't eat it. I've been told to try it with salt and with butter but so far nothing cuts the bitter enough to make it edible.
Luckily the recipe was small, I'm only out 1.5 kg of sugar (got the fruit for free) and my time. But boooo, I was hoping for marmalade!

So if I want to try again with maybe half normal oranges and half rangpur, do I understand it is the acidity that makes it set up?

Maybe the oranges were just too pithy?

rangpurs are weird-- the skins are quite thin, maybe like a satsuma, there is practically no pith.  i could zest them with a zester, but i would probably not be able to do it with anything other than a razor, there's just not that much under the surface.

today i thought maybe it wasn't as horribly bitter --  maybe it will mellow with time? I need to find/make some sort of carby business to try it on with butter and see if things improve, right now all i have is garlic breadsticks and that just seems like a bad idea....

Hmmm... Time could make the difference. Mixing in a little honey, as you use it, might be an option, while you wait to see if it will mellow, in the meantime.

The flavour of your rangpur lime marmalade will definitely mellow over time, there is a distinct difference in flavour between a freshly made batch of marmalade compared with a jar made the previous season.

Meanwhile, if you get any more citrus, make a half half orange and rangpur lime marmalade adding a jar of the pure rangpur marmalade before you add the sugar (this will ensure that the original jar completely dissolves).

There ought to be enough acidity in the orange and rangpur lime combo to get a good set, you may even wish to reduce the ratio of rangpur limes to 1/3.

Please keep us posted on what you decide to do.

Thanks a million, Megan, i will stash half of it and use the rest to make a new mixed batch with oranges (which were cheap this week).
Will keep you posted! I'm still in love with the method, it was just so easy.

I like lemon best.

I make my peels kind of chunky.
I slice the ends off the lemon, and chop them, then when I get to the center where the pips are, I slice them separately into another bowl.
I boil the pulp and the pips in the pressure cooker, so the pectin and the juice go into the water.
Then I strain it. I just use a sieve, not a jelly bag. It's quick. I cook the seedless peels in that water until they are softened, then add the sugar.
I use 1:1 by weight sugar to fruit. Sometimes I have trouble with set, and it gets a bit caramelized, but usually it sets fine. I sweeten my tea with the ones that don't set well enough to spread.

Notes on fruit varieties:
Meyer lemons soften up so fast I there are no chunks in the marmalade unless you add the sugar right away.
Limes (Bearss or Tahitian limes) on the other hand, must be soaked overnight first and pressure cooked a long time before you add the sugar, or the peels come out like leather. OTOH, they're seedless so that's easy.
All the rest work pretty much similarly to each other.
Bergamot orange is lovely and delicate, without losing the basic bitter orange flavor.
Yuzu has a subtly different aroma from lemon. It's mild. I like it. The yuzu tree doesn't bear every year.
Makrut (Thai lime) is my husband's favorite, but I don't care for it. It's very strong and resinous.
Grapefruit is intense. My uncle used to make candied grapefruit peel, so I was accustomed to the flavor. Too many people can't eat grapefruit, so it's hard to give away.
I don't bother with blood oranges or other sweet oranges, or tangerines/clementines/satsumas. If you can eat it raw, why cook it? And I just don't like it as well as lemon. I also tend not to like mixtures.
I used sweet limes once and it was boring, except as sweetener for yogurt, which provided the acidity the sweet limes lacked.

That's a lot of work, Nancy. Also, citrus jams tend to be more fussy and don't always gel properly. They seem to gel a little in storage, but it is still quite soft/runny. My hubby objects to the skins, so I grate the peel of one or two oranges and I don't look to see where they come from: These  Seville oranges are rarely seen here, in Central Wisconsin.
Instead, I make tomato marmalade. I cook my tomatoes. I also put the whole thing in the blender: The seeds and skins disappear and you can't find them. This jam is more like a cloudy jelly and takes little time and no extra fuss. I appreciate that at the peak of the summer, when ripe tomatoes are everywhere. You also get all the nutrition of the skins. [You do have to blend well, though, or the skins will roll up and be noticeable on your tongue].
I use a variation of this recipe, that has commercial pectin [Sure Jell if you have]:
https://www.cdkitchen.com/recipes/recs/7/TomatoPreservesII61734.shtml
Using Orange juice instead of lemon adds a little sweetness, but keep the same amount of sugar. It really can fool your taste buds into thinking that the main ingredient is oranges. It's not. Because you use the blender, the jam ends up very homogeneous and easier to spread.
I found this recipe if you can't find Seville oranges or commercial pectin.
https://www.culinaryhill.com/orange-marmalade-recipe/
What I like in this one is again that it saves you a lot of work by slicing the whole oranges thinly and using the whole fruit [except the pips, of course]. Would using the pith as well make it closer to Seville oranges recipe? I have not tried it yet, so I can't say, but for us who get sweet Texas  and Florida oranges by the case in the winter, it's worth a try. Your beautiful pics  make me salivate!

Hi Ellen, using a pressure cooker to cook the fruit is a good idea - it will probably soften and cook them more quickly so preserving more of the goodness. Also good for smaller amounts prehaps. Alas, I don't have a pressure cooker, perhaps one day....
You've made a fantastic array of citrus marmalade. I was thinking of trying to get a Yuzu tree. I think it might be hardy with me....

Cécile, For some reason I always think of marmalade as made with citrus. I wonder what the difference is between jam and marmalade (that's a subject for another thread perhaps!) It's always useful to have different recipes to use when there is a glut though, so tomato marmalade is another option!

Nancy Reading wrote:Hi Ellen, using a pressure cooker to cook the fruit is a good idea - it will probably soften and cook them more quickly so preserving more of the goodness. Also good for smaller amounts prehaps. Alas, I don't have a pressure cooker, perhaps one day....
You've made a fantastic array of citrus marmalade. I was thinking of trying to get a Yuzu tree. I think it might be hardy with me....

While I've read that high pressure cooking  meat broth might mess with the ability of the meat broth to gel, it is quite alright for fruit jams & jellies. If a person has a large quantity of fruit to prepare, the savings in time and energy is quite substantial. [4-5 minutes  is great to get the fruit cooked]
https://vivienlloyd.co.uk/pressure-cooking-preserves#:~:text=Pressure%20cookers%20soften%20the%20fruit,is%20boiled%20to%20a%20set.

Nancy, I bet yuzu would do fine there. They're cold tolerant and ripen in winter. If you're worried you can give them a south facing wall. I don't know who sells them in Europe. Here in California we aren't supposed to transport citrus scionwood because it spreads the insect host of a citrus disease, so we can't graft them ourselves but have to buy from a certified source.
Yes, I do think I lose less of the volatile oils that make the flavor with a pressure cooker and highly recommend them.
I have collected many used pressure cookers - they show up pretty frequently on the resale market. I actually bought one new for myself as a present decades ago. I use it daily.

Nancy Reading wrote:Cécile, For some reason I always think of marmalade as made with citrus. I wonder what the difference is between jam and marmalade (that's a subject for another thread perhaps!) It's always useful to have different recipes to use when there is a glut though, so tomato marmalade is another option!

You know, Nancy, I feel the same way. To me, marmalade has to have some citrus fruit in it.
As a linguist, I am always intrigued by the etymology of some words. This one had me look it up because I've heard that a long time ago, quince was another fruit, not a citrus, made into a marmalade. Mom used to call it " marmelade de coing", never "confiture de coing" (quince jam). This is what the Wiki has to say about citrus or not citrus:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marmalade#:~:text=The%20well%2Dknown%20version%20is,used%20for%20non%2Dcitrus%20preserves.
And I'm not sure if the distinction is in adding water to the marmalade while not adding any to a fruit jam? Perhaps it was to make more volume for a fruit that was considered  a bit expensive?
I can still remember mom being moved to tears when we got some oranges from our local town as a Christmas present. [It was 1954]. We had never had any until then.
There is also a pineapple marmalade, which is not a citrus but a bromeliad/ tropical fruit. (Still, I think of it as a citrus, even if it's not, probably because all of them are tropical fruit.).

Cécile Stelzer Johnson wrote:And I'm not sure if the distinction is in adding water to the marmalade while not adding any to a fruit jam? Perhaps it was to make more volume for a fruit that was considered  a bit expensive?

I don't think so. I suspect as the link implies it's just a British misuse of the word that has stuck. The water I think is just to facilitate the cooking of fruit that takes a bit of softening (unless you have a pressure cooker!). I put water in some jams too, like blackcurrant for example, because the skins can be a bit tough.

I made a grapefruit marmalade that was popular among family and friends.
I juiced the fruit, then from the rinds and all removed seeds with a spoon, then sliced thinly with a knife on a cutting board, then boiled with a dash of baking soda some water, and the sugar. I've lost that recipe, found on the internet.

Recently I made tangerine marmalade similarly, except I blended the peel and all, but there's no bitter note, which is missed.

Next time I hope to use Seville oranges.

Brian
-

My method is very similar, except I use either Cara Cara or Valencia oranges, since those are what we grow. My orange marmalade is like a hybrid of a jelly and a marmalade. I first zest all of the oranges. Then I juice them all, and add the zest, juice and sugar to my pot. I boil it until it reaches 220F, check if it is setting and fill my jars.
As I use the American version of canning, I fill the marmalade into pints and can then in water, at a rolling boil, for 10 minutes, unless I use my steam canner.  I leave them to cool to room temperature, check my seals, label and store.
Our two trees gives us around 200 pounds of oranges a year. Most of it are used for juice, which  we either drink fresh or I freeze dry it for later use.

I just saw your post Ulla. How wonderful having your own orange trees!
I guess your marmalade is a bit sweeter, using sweet oranges. Do you use the rest of the peels at all? Or are they just compost?

Nancy Reading wrote:I just saw your post Ulla. How wonderful having your own orange trees!
I guess your marmalade is a bit sweeter, using sweet oranges. Do you use the rest of the peels at all? Or are they just compost?

Some are composted since we have so many. The peels make really good compost. When we are out enjoying the yard, we just toss the peels on the ground, and they will be gone the next day since critters also loves them.
I do chop up a gallon or so each year and freeze dry for tea. I make my own tea blends and use orange peels in some.
Some of the oranges I peel off the zest with a potato peeler before we juice them. That peeled zest, I use to make orange extract with alcohol.
I start it when the Cara Cara are ready, and change the peels at the end of the Valencia season. We have about 3 months between the 2 trees. I let them soak for another 3 months, and then strain and use. In total they soak for 6-9 months. How long doesn’t matter much as long as it’s at least 6 month in total. I like that it’s flexible so I can just pick a day to get it done. It’s really good. I gave my nurse a bottle and he says that his kids loves it in yoghurt topped with a few berries. They have stopped asking for sweeteners in their yoghurt as long as they get the extract.
The strained zest peels I sometimes cook in syrup and dry to eat as candies.
I love having our own oranges. It was one of the selling points when we bought this property. That plus that is had 1/2 acre with no landscaping done. The front yard has been growing into a forest garden for the last 7 years. I have a blog here about it. Here is the link https://permies.com/t/220052/Building-food-forest-edge-desert
Once it’s in full production it will give us fresh fruit, vegetables and berries all year round, food for our animals, and be a beautiful home for critters of all kinds and a place where I can meditate and worship Mother Earth. It’s one out of 2 gardens I manage on our property. The second is a raised bed garden.

REPORTING BACK ON MY BITTER MARMALADE:
I cracked a jar last night and my bitter marmalade is bitter, but now in a nice (edible) way, unlike the nuclear-punch-in-the-mouth it was a year or so ago. I just had some for breakfast.

Cécile Stelzer Johnson wrote:

Nancy Reading wrote:Cécile, For some reason I always think of marmalade as made with citrus. I wonder what the difference is between jam and marmalade (that's a subject for another thread perhaps!) It's always useful to have different recipes to use when there is a glut though, so tomato marmalade is another option!

You know, Nancy, I feel the same way. To me, marmalade has to have some citrus fruit in it.
As a linguist, I am always intrigued by the etymology of some words. This one had me look it up because I've heard that a long time ago, quince was another fruit, not a citrus, made into a marmalade.

I thought of you guys when I ran into this last night, looking for a muffin recipe to use the marmalade in. I knew marmalade was made with other stuff (in latinate languages we have marmelada of various things, it's more solid than a jam) but apparently the use of citrus and thinning out is very British. You might find this fun to read! https://longreads.com/2020/07/23/marmalade-a-very-british-obsession/