Adventures in Quince

I didn't know what a quince was until just this week. I had heard the word. I knew that it was a fruit of some kind, but I had never actually seen one until a friend with an overabundance offered to share her fall harvest. This friend had already made quince jam, quince jelly, and quince butter and seemed eager to offload some of her fruit. I imagine she was starting to feel suffocated by quince and I certainly couldn't say no to free, local, organic produce, so I agreed to take a bag. What I received was a few pounds of yellow fruit that looked much like pears with a strange downy fuzz on them and an intense, sweet aroma somewhere between pears and apples. For all who have never seen one, this is what a quince looks like:

Quince. Amaranth Road Studio. 2011.

The quince inundated friend was also kind enough to point me to a good quince jam recipe, so I went home with my bounty and got to work.

Quince are related to apples and pears and generally grow in warm-temperate climates. They are basically inedible raw due to being very hard and sour, but since they are extremely high in pectin they make excellent jams and jellies with the addition of a fair amount of sugar. My quince jam recipe was simple--just grated quince, lemon juice, lemon zest (I actually zested a grapefruit because I didn't have a lemon), and sugar. When the quince flesh is cooked it turns from a light yellow to a bright pink/salmon colour, which looks beautiful when canned in glass jars--almost too pretty to eat in fact!

Quince Jam. Amaranth Road Studio. 2011

Quince have a grainy texture similar to pears but a stronger flavour. The pectin content was definitely high enough to jell the jam without any added pectin so I was grateful that my friend warned me not to do so. Overall a great success in processing Vancouver's local bounty. A huge thank you to the friend who offloaded her quince and sent me off on a culinary adventure.

Quince Jam. Amaranth Road Studio. 2011.