Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Mostarda di Venezia

343. Mostarda di Venezia (Basics etc.)

Now, this recipe is definitely one of those that has been freaking me out for the past 10 months. Even after reading the recipe innumerable times, I couldn’t quite figure out what it was supposed to be. A jam? A chutney? Some sort of preserve? Well, either way, it’s a way of using quinces, and I finally got around to making it last Thursday.

These are the quinces. I got them at Leo's, naturally.


quinces

You start with 1.8 kilos of quinces, then peel, cut and core them, and cook them with a bottle of white wine, some lemon rind and lemon juice until soft and pulpy.


puréed quinces

At this point, Nigella says to push the mush through a food mill, but they were so soft that a good beating with a wooden spoon was enough to purée them sufficiently. Then you weigh the pulp, and add to it the same weight of sugar, before returning it to the pan and adding candied peel and mustard powder.


glacé orange - I found this at Leo's, the good stuff, "whole, in large jars"

So this mixture goes back on the heat until denser and deeper coloured, "about 20-30 minutes". My mostarda was only on the heat for about 10 minutes when it started to burn and catch, so I immediately took it off and let it cool. It looked deeper coloured and denser, so I felt that it was cooked enough.


cooked

And the next day, I put them in dishwasher-washed jars. Now I've got to leave it for a month before I get to eat it. Nigella has some serving suggestions for it, so I'll see y'all back here in a month's time.


jarred

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh man, that looks SO good! Great job.

Anna's kitchen table said...

Sarah, these look really good! I'm dying to know what it tastes like.
I was tempted to buy some from an Italian deli bu wasn't brave enough, LOL
xx