Lavender Jelly: A Recipe With Room For Improvement

Herb jellies are a wonderful way of capturing and preserving those wonderful summer flavours. Imagine on a grey and freezing December day experiencing a burst of mint or lavender or sage fresh from the garden. And herb jellies are one of the easier kinds of jelly to make. You don't have the chore of boiling and extracting juice like you have to do for a fruit jelly. It is more like making tea.



This post does have a recipe for lavender jelly. But it is a recipe I mean to improve on. I wanted to share this little adventure with you to demonstrate that cooking really can be so much alchemy and that no matter how long you have been doing it there is always something to learn.



It is also a demonstration of how a fear of failure lead me to ignore my better instincts when listening to them may have ended up in something better. Sometimes the recipe book is wrong and the more you know about food and how it works the more inspiring a recipe book can be. Instead of being a set of instructions it can be a guide that shows you a path you may not have taken before but you make the decisions about how you get to the destination.



I love lavender. The blossoms, the fragrance, the lovely fat bees it attracts. I have a tiny bit of side walk with a tiny bit of gravel border by my house. I got sick of pulling weeds out of it all the time and decided to plant something there to keep them under control.



I decided on lavender. Why? Because lavender will grow any where. It will grow almost with out soil. As long as it has something for its roots to cling on to and it is well drained it will thrive. And thrive it has for the last three years. Out of a batch of eight baby plants five went into the border and the ones left over went into the back yard. The back yard ones that get dirt and fertalizer and water are spindly and small while the no dirt six inches of gravel never been watered plants are huge and teaming with flowers.



Last year the harvest was so good that I am still making lavender bags. These make lovely gifts. Just simple little muslin or linen bags filled with the dried flower heads.



This year I wanted to use it up some other how. Mum used to make mint jelly when I was little so I though lavender jelly can't be that far removed. And what a great way to capture that beautiful scent of summer to enjoy in the winter months.



There are memories from childhood of steamy Saturday afternoons in the kitchen watcing my Mum at this alchemical process. From a family of fruit growers and shippers she was an old hand even then at preserves. And we had a big garden with lots of produce to put up.



But she gave it up later in life. By the time I was a teenager she rarely made jams and jellies. She had other things she wanted to do. When I told her what I was up to she thought I had taken leave of my senses!





I have started rather late. This is my first time making jelly on my own. And although it did not turn out as well as I wanted it was an amazingly satisfying experience from growing the lavender to spreading the finished product on a breakfast bagel. And in fact I was surprised at how easy it was to obtain an adequate product.





If you have a rummage 'round teh 'nets there are tons of jelly recipes. The first time you try one do not stray too much from the path. The balance of sugar/acid/pectin is very important when making a jelly in order to get it to set. But you might find, like I did, that the recipe did not give you the consistency and sweetness you wanted and there is a little bit of wiggle room for experimentation.



The Ingredients



1 cup lavender flower heads

3 1/2 cups water

4 cups sugar

1/4 cup lemon juice

39 grams powder pectin



The Tools

A large pot is essential.



A strainer or jelly bag is also essential. You can get by with a very fine strainer but for an ultra clear jelly a jelly bag or simply a piece of muslin lining the strainer works the best.



Some extra spoons or saucers and a freezer for testing the set are handy.



Jars of course to put your jelly in. This recipe ended up making four and bit 1/2 pint jars. I just recycle any of the vacuum pop top jars I have collected. You can use the ring screw top masons or the rubber seal kilners as well. NOT the plastic seal kilners. Make sure the jars actually say they are suitable for preserves.



The Method

Make sure your jars and lids are clean
Put your jars (sans lids) in a roasting pan and put them in a medium hot oven
Place your lids in a bowl and pour over boiling water and let them sit in the hot water until you are ready to pot up
Place a couple of saucers or spoons in the freezer
Place the lavender flowers in a bowl
Boil the water and pour over the flowers and let steep for 20 minutes
Strain this mixture into a large deep pot. Like the biggest one you have. The one you use for spaghetti. You can use a regular strainer or a jelly bag would be better
Discard the steeped flowers
If necessary top up the liquid with some extra water so you have 3 1/2 cups liquid
Add the pectin and lemon juice to the liquid and stir over a high heat until the pectin has disolved
Bring to a rolling boil
Add the sugar and stir to disolve
While you are waiting for it to come back to the boil take your spoons/saucers out of the freezer and have them ready and take your jars out of the oven
When the liquid returns to a hard boil keep it there for four minutes (set your timer!)
After four minutes take a small spoonful of the boiling mixture and throw it on your cold spoon or saucer.
If the mixture gels in less than 20 seconds then your jelly has found its set. If not boil for another minute and test again.
When it has found its set take off the heat immediately
Pour into your jars coming to no less than 3mm of the rim
Put on the dried lids and tighten as hard as you can
Leave to cool and listen for the POP. 
 The Result







I am not displeased with the flavour. It is in fact very yummy. I can't wait to use this as a glaze for ham or duck. I was a little bit afraid that the lemon juice would overwhelm the lavender but the comination is heavenly.



I would like it to be a bit less sweet though.



It is the set I am not happy with. When I read the recipe I was skeptical about the huge amount of pectin it called for. But I did not want to mess with it first time out. Lavender does not have any natural pectin in it to help the set.



I was also a bit paranoid about it not setting at all so I boiled for the amount of time the recipe said would give me a medium gel.



The result is unfortunately a rather tough jelly that does not spread very well. I was looking forward to having this with fresh scones and cream but it is far too hard to spread on something that soft. It is not really a medium set at all.



Recommendations



Fortunately I have tons of lavender left to experiment with so I am going to try a couple of variations to see how they turn out. At worst I will end up with some lovley aromatic lavender syrup.



I would cut down on the amount of pectin and also the amount of sugar. This will make a softer and less sweet jelly where the flavour of the lavender really comes through. Hopefully anyway!



Pectin (well, regular old run o' the mill pectin anyway) needs sugar to work. It uses the sugar and acid (which is why you add lemon juice) to create molecular chains that trap the liquid at a molecular level and this is what creates the gel. Less sugar and less pectin will mean fewer chains and a softer jelly.



Some jellies do not need added pectin because most fruit has enough natural pectin in it to set.This is where the pectin you buy actually comes from. It is processed from apples.



I will probably test the set sooner as well. As soon as it comes back to the boil.



SD asked how I knew it would set when it went in the jars and basically if it sets on the spoon or saucer then the whole she-bang is at the stage where it will gel in whatever quantity. It is only the heat at that point that is keeping it liquid.



Be careful not to be as paranoid as I was and let it boil too long either. It will actually get to the point where the pectin is destroyed by the heat and that will result in a failure to set.



If that happens you can let it all cool, stir in more pectin and bring it back to the boil.



This is also why you don't heat the liquid gardually. The longer it cooks the more the pectin deteriorates. Once you have everything in the pot together the key is to boil it as quickly as you can, get the set, and take it off the heat ASAP.



I am so keen to try again and get it just right. I am also in the process of making wild plum jelly. I have the jelly bag hanging up right now and the juice from the plums is an amazing deep ruby red. I am hope the jelly will keep that colour!