Made jam

Quince are a strange, rare fruit; ugly, hard and inedibly tart in the raw state, and available only for a short season of three or so weeks every autumn. They have a uniquely delicious flavour when cooked, however, and hue of their flesh turns from a standard pear-like colour to an attractive ruby-red. What better thing to do, then, on a freezing Sunday morning, than make a kilo or so of them into jam.

Some of the *ahem* fruits of my labour pictured right. The jam is not unusual, nor is the making of it. You use 1 kg quince, 1 kg castor suger, and the juice of two lemons. There is no added pectin; the quince is naturally already quite high in said setting agent and the acid in the lemon juice is all it needs to coax it to do its thing and, well, get the jam to set.

The lemon juice gives the jam a lovely fresh citrus nose, and rather pleasingly, in its delightfully-lingering finish hints of Seville orange marmalade.

It took almost more then I had within me to wait for the smallest jar I filled to set before spooning obscenely hedonistic amounts onto a toasted muffin, laying over curls of a strong cheddar (parmesan would also do charmingly well) and consuming.