Sloe and Bramley Apple Jelly Recipe
Posted by Fiona Nevile in Jam Jelly and Preserves | 110 comments
Tiny pot of sloe and apple jelly
This recipe makes a good raunchy jelly to eat with red meat, game and strong cheese. It’s also great as a sauce base for red meat, such as lamb chops. Danny usually adds a generous dollop to his pheasant casserole and dinky individual game pies, rather than adding a slug of port or sloe gin. As Sloe and Bramley Jelly has a good, strong depth of flavour it is definitely worth making a decent batch for your store cupboard. We use a bit more sugar than the usual 1pt/1lb ratio with this jelly and this seems to work well as we always use cooking apples.
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 pounds/700g sloes, washed
- 1 1/2 pounds/700g of bramley cooking apples (ideal) or any other cooking apples. We use windfalls as they won’t keep.
- Sugar (1 UK pint/750ml/2 1/2 cups of strained juice to 1 1/2 pounds/700g of white granulated sugar, if using cooking apples. 1 pint/750ml/2 1/2 cups of strained juice to 1 pound/454g if using sweet eating apples).
Method:
- Wash the apples, cut out bad bits and chop roughly. There is no need to peel or core the apples.
Place sloes and apples in a large deep heavy bottomed saucepan, or preserving pan. - Add water to cover ½ of the fruit. Bring slowly to the boil and simmer very gently until all the fruit is soft and squishy. (This can take anything from 20 minutes to an hour, depending on how ripe the fruit is.)
- Pour the cooked fruit through sterilised muslin (how do I sterilise muslin? See tips and tricks below). The muslin is often referred to as a “jelly bag”. We use tall buckets to catch the drips from the jelly bags. Rather than hang the bags (conventional method-between two stools) I find it easier to line a large plastic sieve with the muslin. This clips neatly onto the top of a clean bucket. The sieve is covered with a clean tea cloth to protect against flies.
- Leave the jelly bag to drip overnight (or about 12 hours).
- Measure the juice the next day.
- Pour the juice into a deep heavy bottomed saucepan and add 1½ lb/700g of white granulated sugar for each 1pt/570ml of juice.
Heat the juice and sugar gently stirring from time to time, so as to make sure that that all the sugar has dissolved before bringing the liquid slowly to the boil. - Continue to boil for about 10 minutes before testing for a set. This is called a rolling boil. (What is testing for a set? See tips and tricks below).
- Tossing in a nugget of butter towards the end will reduce the frothing that can occur.
When jelly has reached setting point pour into warm sterilised jars using a funnel and ladle. (How do I sterilise jars? See tips and tricks below). - Cover immediately with plastic lined screw top lids or waxed disks and cellophane tops secured with a rubber band.
- Label when cold and store in a cool, dark place. Away from damp.
Tips and tricks:
- What is a jelly bag?
A jelly bag is traditionally a piece of muslin but it can be cheesecloth, an old thin tea cloth or even a pillowcase. The piece needs to be about 18 inches square. When your fruit is cooked and ready to be put in the jelly bag, lay your cloth over a large bowl. Pour the fruit into the centre of the cloth and tie the four corners together so that they can be slung on a stick to drip over the bowl. Traditionally a stool is turned upside down, the stick is rested on the wood between the legs and the jelly bag hangs over the bowl. We experimented and now line a sieve with muslin, place it over a bucket and cover the lot with clean tea cloths (against the flies). - How do I sterilise muslin/the jelly bag?
Iron the clean jelly bag with a hot iron. This method will also sterilise tea cloths. - Jam “set” or “setting point”?
Getting the right set can be tricky. I have tried using a jam thermometer but find it easier to use the following method.
Before you start to make the jam, put a couple of plates in the fridge so that the warm jam can be drizzled onto a cold plate (when we make jam we often forget to return the plate to the fridge between tests, using two plates means that you have a spare cold plate). Return the plate to the fridge to cool for approx two minutes. It has set when you run your finger through it and leave a crinkly track mark. If after two minutes the cooled jam is too liquid, continue to boil the jam, testing it every few minutes until you have the right set. The jam is far more delicious if it is slightly runny. - How do I sterilise the jars?
We collect jars all year round for our jelly, chutney and jam making sessions. I try to soak off labels and store the clean jars and metal plastic coated screw-top lids in an accessible place. The sterilising method that we use is simple. Just before making the jam, I quickly wash and rinse the jars and place them upside down in a cold oven. Set the temperature to 160c/140c for fan assisted. When the oven has reached the right temperature I turn off the heat. The jars will stay warm for quite a while. I only use plastic lined lids for preserves as the all-metal lids can go rusty. I boil these for five minutes in water to sterilise them. If I use Le Parfait jars, I do the same with the rubber rings.
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I picked 10.5 lbs of sloes on Saturday. Some of them will be combined with various forms of alcohol (gin, whiskey, vodka) in the time-honoured tradition and some will be used to make jelly, as I have done for the past 3 years – it’s very popular with family and friends as I give most of it away.
I will also make more jelly with the alcohol-soaked sloes when I have decantered off said gin, whiskey and vodka as I have previously discarded this “mess”.
However, I have experimented (I believe successfully) with Sloe and Bramley Apple JAM, with the following recipe:
1 lb sloes (unstoned weight)
2 large Bramley Apples
1 Orange
1 Lemon (juiced)
2.2 lb Jam Sugar (with Pectin included) or
2.2 lb Granulated Sugar and 1/2 bottle of Certo.
700 ml water.
1. Stone the sloes. I used a cherry stoner, although the sloes are a little tougher.
2. Place the stoned sloes in a maslin pan, ready, and the stones in a separate (smaller) saucepan.
3. Add 200 ml of the water to the stones and boil until the flesh cooks soft and falls off the kernals.
4. In the meanwhile, peel, core and chop the apples quite finely. As you peel and chop etc, place the apples in a separate bowl of water with the lemon juice added to prevent browning.
5. When all the apple is ready, drain them off and add them to the sloes, adding the remaining water, bring the mixture to a boil and simmer until soft, stirring occasionally.
6. Drain the boiled sloe pips into the mixture through a metal seive, and rough them up a bit with the back of a wooden spoon to push through as much of the residuary flesh as possible (don’t forget the underside of the seive).Discard the pips.
7. Take as much of the zest off the orange as you can and add it to the mixture. Juice the orange and add the juice only to the mixture.
8. When all the fruit is soft, add the sugar and stir until dissolved.
9. Bring to a rolling boil for a few minutes, stirring to prevent burning.
10. Remove from the heat and add the Certo (if you haven’t used Jam sugar). Stir in and roll boil for a few minutes longer.
11. Test for setting (you know the drill).
12. When ready, pour into sterilised jars and allow to cool.
Sloes are like cranberries, in that they do leave a bit of a dry after-taste, but this is a very rich jam, made all the nicer with the hint of orange. Try it! Another useful use for sloes, for which I have found very few other recipes.
I have made sloe gin many times and found a recipe for sloe gin duck by the Two Fat Ladies to use the sloes left after straining.I would highly recommend this recipe its delicious.
I left my sloes in the muslin overnight and have some juice and a sediment in the bottom – do in incorporate the sediment or just use the clear juice?
Hi Sharon
Just use the clear juice. BTW if your juice looks cloudy it will go clear when you add the sugar.
This recipe is awesome. I used sloes drained from my sloe gin to make a slightly sweeter version – great on toast and in the middle of a sponge 🙂
I have just made a batch of this jelly, and it is really delicious. I actually wanted to make Rosehip and Apple jelly, but had a ‘blond/grey’ moment and bought bramleys by mistake! Also could only find rosehips locally in a neighbour’s garden on one plant, whilst my local park has enough sloes to feed the whole area! Was not sure what to expect, but it was really delicious and perfect consistency. I usually make blackberry jelly and this is similarly rich, but cannot truthfully say I will not be able to scrape it on toast at some point!!
Thankyou so much for this beautiful recipe.
I have used it 2 years in a row now and it has proved to be a very useful bartering tool to exchange for damsons and plums.
Just in case anyone else comes looking for advice on this point, this year my sloes were picked a little earlier so not as ripe as usual. When I collected the juice the next day it was cloudy and had a heavy layer of what appeared to be starch at the bottom of the bowl. Please be reassured, it does still set perfectly and becomes clear following boiling. The taste is slightly more tart but its still very good.
Thanks for the reply… pleased to tell you it worked out fine.
Used 1.5lbs of damsons, to 1.5lbs of Bramleys. Left it to strain overnight. This yielded 1.5 pints of juice. I tried the 1:1 ratio with sugar, but it was still very tart, so upped it to 2lbs of sugar for the 1.5 pints and this tasted good!
Now have 3 very fine looking 13oz jars of Damson and Apple Jelly.
Many thanks for the help!
Zoë
Hi Zoe
Great to hear that it was a success!
What is this Meyu-maija method? The internet brings up no results, except for this mention.
Hi Derek
I forgot to put in the link to my response to Ron – it’s here https://www.cottagesmallholder.com/fruit-steamers-are-a-brilliant-addition-to-any-busy-kitchen-3529 these steamers are great if you are processing lots of fruit to make into jellie or cordials etc. Also good for cooking chicken (and great stock) 🙂
Do you think Damsons would work instead of sloes in this recipe?
I have about 1.5lbs of damsons left over from making Damson Jam, and lots of windfall apples..
Thoughts?
Hi Zoe
Yes I think that they would be fine. You may need to adjust the sugar slightly.
I am surprised that no one has promoted the Meyu-maija system for jelly making. It makes the messy system of jelly bags redundant.
Lakeland did sell them but under another name. Otherwise try the Internet for this product.
I am just about to make damson jelly and the whole process will take me little more than two hours.
Hi Ron
Yes we have! The article is here https://www.cottagesmallholder.com/fruit-steamers-are-a-brilliant-addition-to-any-busy-kitchen-3529 and you introduced us to them 🙂