Mulberry Jelly
Early Autumn brings a family tradition the mulberry harvest in our garden in Kent. Our mulberry tree is several hundreds of years old, it is so old that it has split into several parts and grows wearily into the lawn. Parts of the tree have fruit, others have given up. Amongst the tangle of low slung branches you can have many adventures, we always sat in it as children and built dens.
By late Summer you can find wonderful giant mulberries and if you haven’t tasted a mulberry, they are a superior berry with a frustratingly short fruiting season. They don’t travel well, bruise and bleed easily and stain everything. They almost collapse as you pick them, making them the most elusive of all the berries. The best thing to do is harvest them quickly and then make the juice for this jelly. It’s not something you can buy, making it all the more special.
ingredients
1 pint mulberry juice, make your own from about 450g fruit
sugar to taste, approx 1/2 cup
4 gelatine leaves, or substitute with a vegetarian equivalent
method
First make the mulberry juice by cooking 450g of fruit in water until soft, mashing and blending the mixture. Then strain to remove all the seeds and pith. To make the jelly dissolve the gelatine, according to the instructions, squeeze out excess water and add into the mulberry juice. Pour into glass bowl and leave overnight to set in the fridge
allergens
**from the gelatine