Marie et malade

This is what I made on the weekend.
Well, actually, the first photo is what I used to make the stuff in the later photos. They came from Sara's garden. Sara doesn't much like grapefruit. Nor marmalade. In fact, she thought these were lemons. We're past that now, and we know they're grapefruit.


I chopped them into quarters, and cut out the pips and the centre pith bits, and popped those extra bits in a bowl with a bit of water. Then the remaining yummy grapefruit bits I sliced and sliced and popped in another bowl with the rest of the 4 litres of water.
And then I waited for 24 hours while they soaked.

After the waiting, there was bringing the water and grapefruit to the boil (pop the water from the pips and the pith in, as this is what will help make it set - something to do with the pectin in the pith and the pips, apparently).
And then there was boiling for an hour.
After which, I was allowed to add the sugar.
6 kilos!!! To 2 kilos of grapefruit! Yes, you wouldn't imagine you could fit it all in the jars, would you.

Anyway, then there was more boiling and waiting and watching it looking volcanic.

Bubble, bubbleAnd then there was lots of pouring and mess (after about a million years of stirring and watching and waiting and testing to see if it would test using the back of a wooden spoon and also some drops on a plate every so often).

And then we had marmalade in jars!