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Dessert

Damson Cheese

A preserve made by boiling damsons with sugar until thick.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 2 ingredients
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Damson Cheese

Oven, in the book's wordsA cool oven

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the fruit

  1. Bake or boil the damsons in a stone jar in a saucepan of water or on a hot hearth.

  2. Pour off some of the juice.

  3. Set the fruit over a fire in the pan.

  4. Boil quickly until it begins to look dry.

  5. Remove the stones.

Make the jam

  1. Add the sugar and stir well.

  2. Simmer slowly for 2 hours.

  3. Boil quickly for another 30 minutes until the sides of the pan candy.

  4. Pour the mixture into pots or dishes about 1 inch thick to set.

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

Damsons
Provide the fruit, pectin and tartness that give the jam its body and flavor.
Sugar
Sweetens the jam and, with long boiling, thickens it and helps it set.

The step that matters

Boil quickly until the sides of the pan candy. Sugar must concentrate to a high level for the jam to set firmly. Stopping too early leaves it runny, while boiling too long can make it stiff and dark.

“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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