Sunday is a good day for me to get busy in the kitchen as Mr Fresh generally does fun dad-and-son activities with Punky. Cuddles is currently having long afternoon naps so that leaves me free to get organised for the week ahead and to cook.

This week I made Citrus Marmalade.  My sister-in-law has a grapefruit tree laden with fruit.  I thought it would be nice to make some of the fruit into a marmalade. With Christmas approaching fast we will have a house full of overseas visitors for a month.  I am feeling the need to get ready for it!!  My neighbor also gave me some of her lemons  this week so I used those in the marmalade as well. 

This is what I made:

Citrus Marmalade Recipe

Ingredients:

• 3 medium oranges
• 2 lemons
• 4 small grapefruit
• 3 liters of water
• 2 tsp of citric acid
• 3kg sugar 

This quantity makes alot of marmalade! I made 11 jars of varying quantities, including two very big pots (see the picture).  Sorry, I really am no good with either names or numbers!! The take away message is – save your jars and sterilize more than you think you will need..

Steps:

1. Wash the fruit well with a dish brush and then dry it.
2. Cut the fruit in half and then thinly slice it.  Ensure you do this in a manner that allows you to catch any escaping juice.  The juice and the slices should be added to the pan.
3. Remove any pips from the fruit and discard them.    
4. Put the sliced fruit and any juice into a large pot or preserving pan and add the water.
5. Bring the pot to a gentle boil and allow to very gently cook for approximately 2 hours until the peel is translucent and soft to touch.
6. Add the remaining ingredients and return to the boil.
7. Wash and dry the jars you will be using to store the marmalade.  Put the jars into an oven heated to 160 degrees for approximately 15 minutes, with the lids.  At the end of the 15 minutes turn the oven to low heat until you are ready to add the mix to the jar.  Remember to remove jars and lids with tongs as they will be HOT!
8. Boil the marmalade mixture very rapidly for approximately 30 minutes and then test for setting ( see Marmalade Hints and Tips below)
9. Once setting point has been reached decant the mixture into warm jars and seal.
10. Clean any spills and label when cool.

For detailed information on sterilizing jars for storage of Preserves review the USD Complete Guide to Home Canning (Guide 01).

**It is important that you ensure you use safe food preparation and storage techniques when preserving. You can find detailed information via the link to the USD Complete Guide to Home Canning.

Hints and Tips:

• Have a back-up packet of Jam Setter on hand when making marmalade or jam. This can be used if setting point is not able to be achieved. Or if you are interrupted during the cooking process and things go haywire!  I have added Jam Setter a day after making runny marmalade as I was interrupted part way through with something the children needed to do.  It worked well and there was no impact on the taste.
• Place the sugar in an oven proof bowl for 5 minutes in the oven prior to adding it to the fruit mix.  The oven should be warm from sterilizing the jars.
• To test the setting point of the marmalade put 3 freezer proof dishes into the freezer for 10 minutes prior to the point of testing.
• When you are ready to test, add 1 teaspoon of marmalade into the dish.  Wait approximately 1 minute then drag your finger across the top of the mix.  If it wrinkles it is ready. If not, continue to boil the marmalade rapidly for another 3 minutes and test again.  If there is no wrinkling after using this approach twice, follow the instructions on the Jam Setter package and add 25gms, boil rapidly and test again.
• The mixture is extremely hot so take care if there are children in the vicinity.

Punky returned from swimming with his dad and got busy with his textas.  He created a few beautiful labels for my many marmalade jars before he got bored and moved onto his next activity!  Mental note to myself that my next project is to find some time to create some beautiful labels for the jars.  The mixture made so many jars that I am going to use them for kinder teacher Christmas gifts as well as gifts for friends as we catch up prior to Christmas Day.  In the meantime, I found some gorgeous ones to use that have been posted by Eat,drink,chic.  They are super cute and saved me alot of time!