To Keep Green Gooseberries
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare the fruit
Gather the gooseberries when they are fully formed but not soft.
Top and tail the gooseberries.
Fill wide‑mouthed bottles with gooseberries up to the neck and cork them slightly.
Preserve
Place the bottles in a pot with sawdust or straw at the bottom and add cold water to reach the necks of the bottles.
Light the fire and bring the water to a boil.
Remove the bottles and fill them with boiling water from a kettle.
Cork the bottles again slightly and let them cool before sealing tightly.
Store the bottles on their sides in a cool, dry place, turning them every other day for a month.
Serve
To serve, combine the liquor and fruit in a dish and sweeten with brown sugar.
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
- Gooseberries
- Provide the fruit and acidity that make up the preserved product.
- Brown sugar
- Sweetens the liquor and fruit when the preserve is served.
The step that matters
Sealing the bottles after cooling. Sealing tightly only after the bottles cool keeps the contents from being pushed out or drawn in by pressure changes. Sealing while hot can crack glass or trap an unsafe seal, and the fruit stays protected from air and spoilage when the seal is airtight.
“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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