Mint jelly

Mint is known to take over a garden, its roots burrowing underground and suddenly appearing just where you don’t want it. This is the answer, a homemade mint jelly to accompany your Sunday roast lamb! A very easy recipe with no straining through muslin required!

From my mother's recipe book -

1-2 kg of apples, washed, cored and sliced (no need to peel) - I used Bramley apples

450g granulated sugar - measure according to the amount of apple liquid once strained

600ml cider vinegar per kg of apples

(I did as my mother suggested and used 300ml water and 300ml vinegar)

1-2 tablespoons of finely chopped mint

Put your prepared apples into a saucepan with the liquid and cook slowly until tender.

When the apples are cooked, spoon them into a fine sieve over a large bowl. Let this sit for up to an hour until all the juice is through.

Don’t be tempted to push it through the sieve or your jelly will be cloudy

While the juice from the apples is dripping into the bowl, finely chop the mint. Then measure the liquid into a saucepan and add 450g sugar for each 600ml of juice. Boil for 8-10 minutes and test for set. See my post on 'All you need to know about making jam' for instructions on how to do this.

If it’s ready, stir in the finely chopped mint – 1 tablespoon per 600ml of jelly.

Spoon the jelly into jars (you will get 3-4 small jars from 1kg of apples) and store. As the recipe says, it will keep indefinitely given a chance!

1kg of apples will give you approximately 400ml of strained juice so if you want to make a few jars to gift to friends, I would recommend doubling or tripling the quantities.

While mint jelly is perfect for your Sunday roast, I've also added it to my pea and mint soup for that extra hint of mint.

Chocolate Fudge

A crumbly melt-in-the-mouth chocolate delight! Making fudge is easy as long as you keep an eye on it, and the results are well worth it. Here is my grandmother’s basic recipe.

550g caster sugar

350ml evaporated milk

110g dark chocolate, grated or chopped into small pieces

60g butter

Butter a square tin (about 20cm)

Melt the butter in a heavy based saucepan, then add the remaining ingredients and allow to dissolve over a low heat, stirring continually.

Turn up the heat and bring to the boil quickly. The mixture will bubble up inside the pan, so keep stirring in case it catches on the bottom.

If you have a sugar thermometer (I don’t), keep boiling until the temperature reaches 115ºC. Or you can use the ‘soft ball test’ which is to drop a teaspoonful into cold water and if it forms a soft ball, it’s ready. Check after about 10 minutes.

Remove the pan from the heat and beat with a wooden spoon until ‘granulated’. This takes about five minutes and you will notice it changing consistency. Now you can customise it by adding nuts or dried fruits, or just leave it plain.

Pour into the greased tin and when nearly set, mark into cubes. When it's completely cool, remove from the tin and the marks you made will allow you to cut it into squares without it breaking. This makes a lovely gift wrapped in tissue paper or cellophane.

If you have mastered this, try the famous fudge recipe from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang ... Monsieur Bon Bon's Secret Fooj

Treacle tart - one of the 'Great British Classics'

This newspaper cutting was in my mother's book and gives an interesting background to the origins of treacle.

I have increased the quantities to fill a 23cm tart tin.

This recipe assumes you have bought ready-made shortcrust pastry. And nothing wrong with that! Just remember to take it out of the fridge about an hour before you need to use it.

350g shortcrust pastry

90g fresh breadcrumbs

1½ tbsp lemon juice

350g golden syrup

grated nutmeg

1 egg, beaten to glaze

Preheat the oven to 180ºC and grease a loose bottomed tart tin with butter paper.

Roll out ¾ of the pastry, quite thinly, keeping the remainder for the lattice top. Line the tin with the pastry and use your rolling pin to level off the top. Prick the base lightly with a fork and put it in the fridge to keep cool. Roll out the remaining pastry and put in between layers of greaseproof paper in the fridge.

Now for the filling. Heat the syrup in a saucepan and add the breadcrumbs, lemon juice, and grated nutmeg. Mix well and let it warm through. Take the tart case out of the fridge and pour in the mixture.

For the lattice top, I have taken advice from the original recipe. Cut the reserved pastry into 1cm strips, slightly longer than the edges of the tin. Lay half of the strips across the tin at equal distance, pressing down on one side only to secure. Fold back alternate strips and lay across another strip at right angles. Return the strips to their original position and then fold back the alternate strips. Lay across another strip and then return alternate strips to their original position. Then starting with the first strips, continue folding back and laying strips at right angles across the tart, until all the strips are interwoven. Moisten the edges of the strips, seal and secure on the edges of the tart. Trim, if necessary, and brush with the egg glaze.

Bake for 25-30 minutes. Remove from the oven and leave in the tin to cool completely. Take it out of the tin and put onto a serving plate. Delicious served with cream or ice-cream.