Excellent Damson Cheese
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fruit
Bake or stew the damsons until tender.
Drain off the juice.
Skin the damsons.
Stone the damsons.
Return ⅓ to ½ cup of juice to the fruit.
Weigh the damsons.
Make the cheese
Boil them over a brisk fire until they form a dry paste.
Add 6 ounces of pounded sugar for each pound of damsons.
Stir until dissolved.
Continue boiling while stirring until the mixture leaves the pan dry and adheres to the spoon.
Press the mixture into pans or molds.
Store
Cover with a paper dipped in spirits once cool.
Tie another layer of paper over it.
Store in a dry place.
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
- Damsons
- Provide the fruit body and pectin that set the cheese into a firm, sliceable paste.
- Pounded sugar
- Sweetens the paste and, with long boiling, helps it thicken and keep without spoiling.
The step that matters
Boiling until the mixture leaves the pan dry. Sugar and fruit must be cooked down until most of the water has evaporated. Undercooked mixtures stay soft and wet, while overcooking scorches the sugar and makes the paste tough.
“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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