Marmalade!

I'll give you a break from the Greece pictures today! I made blood orange marmalade yesterday. It was so much fun and my second attempt at canning anything. My first attempt was strawberry jelly last year on my tiny stove in my tiny kitchen in Virginia. It was a disaster - the stove had so little power that the jam never got to the correct temperature and it cooked so long that the strawberries lost their flavor and color! I ended up with a runny, tasteless mess! ACK! This time was different - yeah! I borrowed a recipe from Alton Brown on the Food Network and here's how you do it:
- scrub 4 oranges and 1 lemon
- slice the oranges really thinly - 1/8 inch thick and cut into quarters
- zest and juice the lemon
- place the oranges, lemon zest and lemon juice in a BIG stainless pot and add 5 cups of water.
- bring to a boil over high heat, turn down to medium and vigorously simmer for 40 minutes stirring occasionally
- turn up the heat to a boil and add 3 1/2 pounds of sugar - stirring constantly
- here's where it gets a little tricky
- you need the mixture to reach 220 degrees so grab your candy thermometer and keep stirring over medium/medium high heat
- make SURE it doesn't bubble over - you'll have a huge mess that is very hard to clean up
- in the meantime bring a big pot of water to a boil and boil your jars, lids, tongs and ladle for 10 minutes. Turn off the heat under the pot.
- once the marmalade is 220 degrees it is ready to be jarred.
- take the jars out of the hot water with tongs and place on a clean towel
- ladle the jam into the jars and screw a lid on - be careful it's VERY HOT and will burn you!!
- once all the jam is in the jars and the lids are on tightly the Agriculture Dept says you need to process the jars for 10 minutes - that is put them back into the pot of boiling water making sure they don't touch the bottom of the pot or each other - put a rack or tea towel on the bottom of the pot
- remove the jars from the water after they have processed and set them upside down on the counter so that the orange pieces won't all settle to the bottom. once they have cooled for a few hours flip them upright and the orange rinds will settle nicely in the middle
- make sure all the lids have sealed by checking to make sure the center of the lid is sucked down towards the marmalade
- voila! enjoy on toast, crumpets, scones or, my favorite, pork chops (with garlic and whole grain mustard!)

Here's the link to the recipe on foodnetwork.com click here