I am totally making this. (Dandelion jelly)
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You are both so fortunate having fruit bushes, we've never owned a garden that gave enough fruit. I miss collecting from the mature quince tree just outside my old workplace.
If you have a Lidl nearby, on Thursday I found this on their shelves
Pear & cherry liquor jam. From Portugal and £2 a jar. Has lots of bits of fruit yet is fluid to spread.
Absolutely fabulous,
I'm going to another Lidl tomorrow to hunt for more!@AndyD said in I am totally making this. (Dandelion jelly):
You are both so fortunate having fruit bushes, we've never owned a garden that gave enough fruit.
One mature red currant bush will make a couple of batches of jelly, probably 16 half-pint jars. If you add store bought (like the strawberries and blueberries I used), then of course you get even more.
I have two red gooseberry bushes. Last year was the second year I had them and they yielded 8 half pint jars of jam and 8 half pint jars of chutney.
The black currant bushes have not been nearly as prolific. A handful of berries to snack on. Hoping for better yields this year.
The jostaberry, a black currant/gooseberry cross, gave up about a dozen berries last year. A real disappointment.
Those preserves look nummy. I keep looking for Lidl stores but they're still only on the east coast here in the US, and I'm in the middle.
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I made violet jam one year. Not worth it, weak as water. My favorite jams to make are strawberry with local fresh picked fruit, and marmalades of any citrusy fruit. I never use as much sugar as called for, preferring sweet and tart. Most store bought is way too sweet for my taste.
Andy, I dyed wool with dandelion blossoms once. Processed it in a white enamel pot. More dye ended up staining the pot than got in the wool! I may have not mordanted correctly. Will try again some time.
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It's very different from picking and chopping quince for jam. Can be done by one but nice to have help.
- concentrated dandelion pollen gives me mild hayfever/asthma
- it becomes ever more difficult to strip the petals as the heads dry and close; pick the largest heads and pluck their petals on the same day. Pinching & rolling the green partbetween finger and thumb opens & loosens the flower...
- a green lawn at the end of the day will be yellow again next morning
Now I need to buy pectin.
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A half carrier bag of head/petals makes 11 cups of (quite dark looking) juice. So we multiplied the online recipe by about 3.
2 bags of sugar (10 cups)
6 tablespoons of lemon
A bottle of the only pectin I could find
Roll boiled for about 10 mins, it seems nicely scented
When ladled out it filled 11 standard bottles of jam
Fingers crossed it sets nicely
