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To Preserve Strawberries

Preserves strawberries by cooking them with sugar into a syrup.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 2 ingredients
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To Preserve Strawberries

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the strawberries

  1. Gather strawberries in dry weather, ensuring they are large and ripe.

  2. Hull the strawberries and spread them out on flat dishes.

  3. Sift 1 pound of powdered loaf sugar over the strawberries.

  4. Mash the inferior and overripe strawberries with 1 pound of powdered loaf sugar.

  5. Heat the mashed strawberries in a basin over boiling water until thick juice forms.

  6. Strain the thick juice.

Make the syrup

  1. Mix the strained juice with the remaining powdered loaf sugar.

  2. Boil the mixture in a porcelain kettle, skimming off any scum.

  3. Add the whole strawberries and their exuded juice to the syrup.

  4. Heat the mixture gently without boiling.

Cook in stages and store

  1. Remove the strawberries one by one with a teaspoon.

  2. Spread the strawberries on dishes to cool, ensuring they do not touch each other.

  3. Repeat the process of heating and cooling until the strawberries are clear.

  4. Once cooled, place the strawberries and syrup into jars or pots 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

Strawberries
Provide the fruit, which is cooked until it turns clear and holds its shape in the syrup.
Powdered loaf sugar
Sweetens the fruit and, at high concentration, draws out juice and preserves the strawberries.

The step that matters

Heating without boiling. Boiling the syrup or strawberries too hard can break down the fruit and make it mushy and cloudy. Gentle heating lets sugar slowly penetrate the berries while they keep their shape and clarity.

“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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