part of the cumquat marmalade making project was about endurance. following things through, taking the time to do something well. following the instructions but also improvising where required.

after the cumquats were sliced and de-seeded, they soaked in water for 8 or so hours. then i boiled them in soaking water until tender, added a huge amount of sugar, and kept the mixture simmering until it set to a jelly-consistency. the recipe book said this would take about 20 minutes. in reality, i think it took about 2 hours; two hours of fearing i might burn the marmalade (as i have done in the past, recalling a winter as housewife in whitstable), or that maybe the pectin (released from the seeds i saved and soaked) wasn’t good, or there wasn’t enough of it. but eventually, many hours and taste testing later, the marmalade set enough (on a cold saucer, fresh from the freezer) for it to be time to put the transformed fruit into containers.

transformation

this idea of transformation is what i love about the process. we still call this cumquat marmalade, referring to the original fruit that i bought at the greengrocer (that many others planted, tended, pruned & picked & packed & transported to glebe) but it has been transformed. but eating the marmalade (i imagine) will still invoke the sense of cumquat, or the ‘feeling’ of the fruit (not the literal touch-sense-feeling, but a more affectual sense of feeling)