Skip to main content
Dessert

Barberry Jelly

A sweet jelly made from barberries, water, and powdered sugar.

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

Barberry Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Extract the juice

  1. In a pot, combine barberries and cold water. Boil for 15 minutes.

  2. Bruise the barberries with the back of a wooden spoon.

  3. Pour the mixture into a fine sieve or muslin strainer, then pass the juice through a jelly bag until clear.

Make the jelly

  1. Weigh the clear juice and boil it rapidly for 10 minutes.

  2. Stir in an equal weight of fine powdered sugar until dissolved.

  3. Boil the jelly again for 10 minutes, skimming off any foam.

  4. Pour the hot jelly into warm jars or glasses to prevent breaking.

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 tart fruit flavour and the juice that the jelly is made from.
Fine powdered sugar
Sweetens the jelly and helps it set as it cooks down.

The step that matters

Boil the clear juice rapidly before adding sugar. Rapid boiling evaporates water and concentrates the juice's natural pectin and acid, which is what lets the jelly set. Boiling too gently leaves it runny.

“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