I am totally making this. (Dandelion jelly)
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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
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Update on the dandilion jelly.
It had to be gently reheated and lots of pectin added to make it set.
Work out how much pectin you think you might need and use double that, would be my rough estimate.Tastes sweet, a little lemony and as you'd expect, of crushed dandelions.
