Candied Cranberries
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the syrup
Cut three tiny slits in each cranberry.
Combine sugar and water to make a syrup.
Allow the syrup to cool.
Add the cranberries to the syrup and bring to a boil slowly.
As soon as it boils, remove from heat and let stand overnight.
Cook and dry
The next day, drain the syrup from the berries and boil the syrup until reduced to half its volume.
Add the berries back to the syrup, heat slowly to boiling, and boil gently for 3-4 minutes.
Let the mixture cool, then boil again for 5 minutes.
The next day, drain off the syrup and spread the berries on a lightly buttered plate or waxed paper until the surface dries.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Cranberries
- Provide the tart fruit that becomes tender and glossy as the sugar penetrates them.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the berries and, dissolved in water, forms the syrup that preserves them as candy.
- Water
- Dissolves the sugar so it can form a syrup that penetrates the berries.
The step that matters
Slow heating and repeated cooling in syrup. Boiling the berries too hard or too fast can split their skins and toughen them. Slow heating, then resting overnight, lets sugar gradually replace the water inside the fruit, so the berries stay plump and hold their shape.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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