Miso, membrillo and toasted sesame seeds

I cut the membrillo into pieces last night - half for me, half for L; a bit extra for her to give back to M... Then half of our bit into pieces to store in the freezer for future use and the other half to eat right away / to keep in the fridge. I think it should keep quite a long time in the fridge, but just in case that doesn't work out the frozen stuff is back-up. We managed to make quite a big dent in it last night alone - S is a big fan. He was eating it on lightly toasted bread slices with manchego. I decided that the membrillo was amazing on the aforementioned toasted bread, over a smear of white miso and below a sprinkling of toasted sesame seeds - sweetness, tang, crunch, saltiness and toastiness.

Membrillo

After I made quinces in syrup a few weeks ago I had membrillo on my mind - was curious to see how it worked, but with only a couple of quinces that day it didn't seem like the best idea. Then, what luck - M and L furnished me with masses of beautiful, locally harvested quince! L and I made pickled quinces, quinces in syrup and a huge, beautiful, bendy brick of fragrant, pinkish-amber jelly-paste... membrillo!

We referred to this recipe (on the same site as the quinces in syrup one), but the basic recipe seems to be the same everywhere, and pretty straightforward (although somewhat time consuming).

quinces - any quantity, at least 6 to make it worth it though I'd say; we ended up with 4 lb 7 oz after prepping and initial boiling / draining
sugar - same weight as the boiled+drained quinces
lemon juice - I added the juice of one lemon to the 4 lb 7 oz of quince

Peel and core the quinces, cut out any bad bits and chop the good stuff into chunks. Put in a big pan, cover with water and boil for about 30 min, until the quinces are very soft. Drain away all the excess water, then weigh the quinces (at this point we had 4 lb 7 oz).

Use a wand blender to liquidise the quince pieces - try and make it as smooth as you can.

Put the pan back on the heat, add the sugar (same weight as the boiled+drained quinces) and lemon juice, bring to the boil and simmer until is has become a pinkish-amber colour and thickened.

Heat the oven to a low temperature - ~120F / 50C. Line a roasting tin or other rectangular, oven-proof, high-sided container with baking paper, lightly greasing the inside of the paper so the quince paste won't stick. Transfer the reduced quince paste to the greased, lined tin and put in the oven for ~60 min to dry out.

Remove from the oven and let cool. It will firm up as it cools, and then you should be able to lift it out of the tin by grabbing the paper at the edges, and it should come easily away from the paper and have a jellyish, sliceable consistency.

Pickled quinces

The last blast of the harvesting season came via M from LUrC. L was kind enough to collect ~15 lb of quinces for her and me to share. She arrived at my place last night with a backpack rammed with quinces. As soon as she walked past me into the apartment I got a waft of their wonderful smell. We spent the evening chopping, chatting, listening to the radio, eating yellow potatoes and pickled green tomatoes, and making beautiful quince preserves. We made half of them into membrillo, and sliced half of what was left thinly to make quinces in syrup and the rest in chunks to make these pickled quinces. The pickled quince recipe we used is here - L looked it up and said she didn't find anything on American sites (perhaps quinces are not common / not commonly used here?), and she consequently got a bit confused about metric measurements...

(we doubled the recipe below to get four large jars)

250 ml cider vinegar
750 ml water
200 g sugar
4 strips lemon zest
6 cloves
1 tsp black peppercorns
1 tsp coriander seeds
1 cinnamon stick
3 bay leaves
1 star anise
2 (or 350g) quince, peeled, cut into eighths

Put all the ingredients except the quince into a large saucepan, bring to a simmer, then add the peeled, cored, halved and eighthed quinces, then turn down to a gentle heat and leave to cook for 20-25 minutes until tender.

Gently lift the quince pieces out of the liquid with a slotted spoon and put them into sterilised jars. Pour over the liquor, seal and cool. They will keep for a few weeks.

Spiced quince in syrup

Another thing I'd had hanging around in the fridge for too long was a couple of quinces. I love quinces, but it always takes a bit of activation energy to get through the prep: those cores are HARD. Worth it though. I noticed this recipe and it was simple enough to spur me to put those quinces into syrup (I accidentally made it even simpler, to no ill effect).

2 quinces
300 ml water
125 g brown sugar (or white)
5 green cardamom pods
1 clove
small piece of star anise (1/6 of a star)
1 cinnamon stick
2-3 strips of lemon rind
2 tbsp honey

Peel and core the quinces, and slice thinly. I had ~250 g quince when prepped. Put the quince slices in a pan with all the other ingredients, bring to the boil and simmer for ~20 min, until the quinces are softened but not falling apart. Remove spices if you like (if not then be careful not to crunch them by accident when eating the quince), transfer quince slices and liquid into a sterile, wide-mouthed jar, cover and let cool. Keep in the fridge (unless you feel like water bath processing them) for 2-3 weeks at least (if they last that long).


These are really delicious - the quince taste, spices and brown sugar balance out really beautifully to make a very fragrant, lovely snack... yup, I have been snacking these straight out of the jar with a teaspoon.

Baked quince with anise

Saw some quinces at the market so of course had to buy them... then figure out what to do with them.  They didn't ripen up very well and I had to cut off quite a lot of brown, but there was some good flesh there and Google led me to this Nigel Slater / Guardian recipe, full of sweetness and aromatics.

4 heaped tbsp sugar
500ml water
4 cloves
2 star anise
4 smallish quinces
½ a lemon
4 tbsp maple syrup

Put the sugar and water into a saucepan and bring to the boil. Add the cloves and star anise. Peel and halve the quinces and rub them with lemon to stop them browning.

Lower the quinces into the sugar syrup and let them simmer till tender. They may be ready in 25 minutes or perhaps take a little longer, depending on their size and ripeness.

Set the oven at 180C/350F/gas mark 5. When they are tender to the point of a knife, lift the quinces out and put them in a shallow baking dish or roasting tin. Take 150ml of the cooking liquid, add the maple syrup and, together with the aromatics, pour over the quinces.

Bake for 30 minute or so till very soft and tender. Serve with their cooking juices.