A blueprint for jams,
preserves and a kind
of marmalade
Christine Ferber (or ‘La Reine Confiture’, as
I call her) poetically calls jam ‘a primordial
marriage of fruit and sugar’. I’m more a two- night-
stand jammer – the same passion for
preserves, but less application to traditional
efort. My method calls for less sugar (than
traditional) and is more chill (lit and fig),
relying on overnight refrigerator rests. This is
my favourite technique of Christine’s preserve
practice because it thickens the jam without
the tooth-aching feel and cement-like texture
of too much sugar.

You can follow the specific recipes on page 283
or make jam with any ragtag gang of fruit you
want to throw together. Offcuts you stash in the
freezer over a year of baking – bruised berries,
a halved blood orange or stone fruit that
shrivelled rather than ripened to supple,
slipping-off skin. Embrace being flexi-fruit!
If you’re short on strawberry, make up the
difference with raspberries.

Marmalades are made from a chewy rind and
bitter pith that needs an overnight soak to soften
before it even looks at a packet of sugar. Although
the citrus is tangy by nature, I still add the extra
acidulated liquid (rather than water) because
I  like my tang-factor high. And I add a portion of
peeled and chopped fruit so the rind is balanced
with a higher percentage of juicy flesh. Use blood
oranges, tangelos or oranges, or a combination
of these. Mandarin skins are less pithy, so
the marmalade will be texturally softer. Using
100  per cent grapefruit isn’t a favourite because
of naringin – a bitter-bringing flavonoid – but I’ll
always consider it in a supporting juice role.

Just the facts jam
• My golden and easily remembered jam ratio
is three parts fruit to one part sugar – from
there, add more sugar if the fruit is sour (like
sour cherries) or balance with citrus. You need
a healthy amount of sugar to achieve that
gorgeous glossiness a jam should have.

• Choose a wide jam pot to drive off liquid
swiftly – slow-boiled jam has a dull colour
and  flavour.

• Pectin is stronger in slightly underripe fruits
so if you are making a jam with older fruit, it
will be less set. A squeeze of citrus and the
just-squeezed husk will add some natural
setting  power.

• Fruit piece size matters: cut your fruit close to
the size you’d like in your final jam. If you have
cut it too big, a hearty squidge with a potato
masher at the end will de-chunkify.

• Spices will emit lots of flavour during the rests
and boils, so restrain the starting amount.

My jam plan on page 283 will turn plethoras of
plums, strawberry surfeits, too many tangelos
and blood orange bounties into spoon-dipping,
toast-swiping, cake-layering goodness. I hope my
jam becomes your jam.