Solbærgelé

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Large heavy-bottomed pot, 4 litre
• •Jelly bag or large piece of muslin cloth
• •Deep bowl for catching strained juice
• •Sterilized glass jars with lids, 200ml
• •Sugar thermometer (optional)
• •Wide-mouth funnel
• •Wooden spoon
• •Ladle

Instructions

1. 1

   Cook the berries

   Put the blackcurrants and water into a large heavy-bottomed pot. You don't need to be fussy about removing every tiny stalk fragment; a few won't hurt. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat, then lower the flame and cook for twenty to twenty-five minutes, pressing the berries against the side of the pot with a wooden spoon every few minutes. You want them completely collapsed, soft, and swimming in deep purple juice. The kitchen will smell sharp and fruity, almost wine-like. That's right.

   Don't boil the berries hard. A gentle simmer extracts the juice and the natural pectin without cooking the flavor into bitterness. Low and slow is the whole strategy here.
2. 2

   Strain overnight

   Set a jelly bag or a large square of muslin over a deep bowl, secured with string or a rubber band so it won't collapse under the weight. Pour the cooked berries and all their juice into the cloth. Let it drip. Walk away. Leave it for at least eight hours, or overnight. The juice will come through slowly, clear and intensely colored, collecting in the bowl beneath. Do not press the bag, do not squeeze it, do not be tempted. Pressing forces pulp through the weave and the jelly loses its clarity. You'll end up with something cloudy and dull instead of the jewel-bright preserve you're after.

   Hang the bag from a cupboard handle over the bowl if you can. Gravity works better when the bag hangs freely rather than sitting in a pool of its own juice.
3. 3

   Measure juice and sugar

   The next morning, measure your juice. You should have roughly 700 to 800ml from a kilogram of berries. For every 500ml of juice, weigh out 375g of granulated sugar. This ratio gives you a jelly that sets firmly but stays tart, not cloying. Blackcurrants are naturally very high in pectin, so you need nothing added. Pour the strained juice into a clean heavy pot, add the sugar, and stir over low heat until every grain has dissolved completely. Don't rush this step. Undissolved sugar crystallizes in the finished jelly and ruins the smooth set you're working toward.

   Put two or three small plates in the freezer before you begin this step. You'll need them for the wrinkle test in a few minutes.
4. 4

   Boil to setting point

   Once the sugar has dissolved, raise the heat and bring the liquid to a full rolling boil. Let it boil hard for eight to twelve minutes. The surface will foam and rise; that's the pectin reacting with the sugar and the heat. Stir occasionally to keep it from catching on the bottom. After eight minutes, start testing. Take the pot off the heat, drop a teaspoon of the liquid onto one of your frozen plates, wait ten seconds, then push it with your fingertip. If the surface wrinkles and holds its shape, the jelly is set. If it runs and stays liquid, put the pot back on the heat, boil for two more minutes, and test again. You'll know when it's right.

   Always take the pot off the heat while you test. Those extra seconds of boiling while you wait can push the jelly past its setting point, and overcooked jelly turns rubbery and dark. Better to test twice than to overboil once.
5. 5

   Skim and jar

   Use a spoon to skim any foam from the surface. The foam is harmless but it clouds the jelly, and after all that patient overnight straining you want the finished jar to be perfectly clear. Ladle the hot jelly into sterilized jars, filling them almost to the brim. Seal immediately with sterilized lids. As the jelly cools over the next hour, the lids will pull inward with a small click. That click is the vacuum seal forming, and it means the jar will keep in a cool, dark cupboard for up to a year. Let the jars cool completely before you move them. The jelly needs to set undisturbed.

   Sterilize your jars by washing them in hot soapy water, rinsing well, then placing them upside down in the oven at 120C for fifteen minutes. Keep them warm until you fill them. Hot jelly into a hot jar is what gives you the seal.

Chef Tips

• •The best blackcurrants for jelly are slightly underripe, still firm, with a few red ones mixed in among the black. Underripe berries carry higher pectin levels, and pectin is what gives the jelly its set. Fully ripe, soft berries make better saft or syrup.
• •If you own a sugar thermometer, setting point is 104.5C. But the wrinkle test on a cold plate is more reliable in a home kitchen, because your altitude, your pot, and even the humidity in the room all shift the number slightly. Trust the plate, not the dial.
• •Solbærgelé belongs next to cheese. A jar on the table beside a good Vesterhavsost or a sharp Danbo is one of the simplest and best things in the Danish pantry. The tartness cuts through the fat and salt in a way nothing else quite does.
• •Save the spent pulp in the jelly bag. Press it through a sieve, sweeten it lightly, and you have the beginning of a solbærgrød or a filling for a tart. Nothing wasted from a short season.

Advance Preparation

• •This is a two-day process. Cook and strain on day one, boil and jar on day two. Plan to start the evening before you want to finish.
• •Sealed jars keep for up to a year in a cool, dark cupboard. Once opened, store in the fridge and use within four weeks.
• •Blackcurrants freeze beautifully. If you pick more than you can process in one session, spread them on a tray, freeze until solid, then bag them. Frozen berries make jelly just as well as fresh, so you can preserve in smaller batches through the autumn when you have the time.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 260g)