The Nankings are ready. Just like a lot of plants this year, they’re about 2 or 3 weeks early.
Unfortunately, we haven’t had any come through Fruit Share. Hopefully that means everyone has found wonderful ways to use them themselves.
We greedily harvested the ones in our own back yard and made juice, syrup and jelly with them.
If you’re wondering what to do with your nankings, here are some ideas.
To get the juice…
To get the pulp…
Of course you don’t need to separate the pulp and the juice. Usually, I don’t, but this year I was experimenting with my new toy from Lee Valley – the jelly strainer.
If you don’t separate the pulp from the juice, your jams, jellies and syrups will be thicker and not transparent. Despite what the jelly judges at a country fair might say, I actually prefer having a little more texture in my spreads.
Before I even got to make any preserves, we found a lot of ways to eat our nankings:
- raw, right off the bush
- juice – unsweetened mixed 1/2 and 1/2 with club soda (adults’ preference)
- juice – unsweetened mixed with apple juice (kids’ preference)
- pulp – over ice cream
- pulp – over pancakes and waffles
- pulp – in muffin recipes instead of applesauce (Note: this will turn muffins an interesting colour!)
When I finally did make preserves, I made syrup and a preserve (cross between jam and jelly). I love the tart flavour of nankings so I always end up modifying recipes to reduce the sugar content. By doing so, my syrup and my preserves end up being less stiff than what they’re “suppose” to be, but they are delicious!
Nanking Syrup
4 cups of nanking juice
1 1/2 cups of sugar (recipes often call for 4-6 cups of sugar)
1 package of light pectin (if using full sugar amount, pectin is not needed)
3 Tbsp lemon juice
Boil for 2 minutes. Pour into sterilized jars, seal and heat process for 5 minutes.
Nanking Preserve
4 cups of nanking pulp
2 cups of sugar (recipes often call for 4 cups of sugar)
1 package of light pectin
Boil for 2 minutes. Pour into sterilized jars, seal and heat process for 5 minutes.
Note: There is some debate as to whether or not fruit preserves need to be heat processed. Some (Kraft, the makers of Certo) argue that because of the high acidity and high sugar you do not need the final heat process as long as you are using properly sterilized canning equipment. Others (Depts. of Agriculture) still recommend heat processing fruit preserves for 5 minutes even if using sterilized equipment. I choose to err on the side of caution and use sterilized equipment and heat processing.
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Jul.30,2010
