Skip to main content
Dessert

Barberries, to Preserve

A method for preserving barberries in a sugar syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 3 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Barberries, to Preserve

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Sprinkle some sugar over the barberries.

Make the syrup

  1. In a pot, combine the remaining sugar with water to make a strong syrup.

Cook and store

  1. Add the barberries to the syrup and bring to a rapid boil to preserve their color.

  2. Fill jars with the preserved barberries for storage.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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

Barberries
Provide the fruit itself, with their tartness and color, which the syrup preserves.
Powdered loaf sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, at high concentration, draws water out to preserve it.
Water
Dissolves the sugar to form the syrup that the barberries are cooked in.

The step that matters

Bringing the barberries to a rapid boil in the syrup. A rapid boil heats the fruit quickly, helping it hold its bright red color rather than fading. Sugar concentration in the syrup is what keeps the preserved fruit from spoiling in storage.

“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.

You might also like

White CakeWhite Cake431 recipesPound CakePound Cake373 recipesOrange Bundt CakeOrange Bundt Cake349 recipesSpice CakeSpice Cake344 recipes