The keeper sweets of the cellar
Preserved Spiced Apples
PreservingEvocation🍯 🍋 🌶️moyen50 min
Apple wedges preserved in a syrup of sugar, vinegar, and spices: a sweet-and-sour preserve that accompanies breads and roasted meats all winter, while the garden sleeps.
The keeper sweets of the cellar
Apple wedges preserved in a syrup of sugar, vinegar, and spices: a sweet-and-sour preserve that accompanies breads and roasted meats all winter, while the garden sleeps.
When the orchard sheds its leaves and the cold sets in, I save autumn in jars. I simmer apple wedges in a spiced syrup of cinnamon and cloves, sharpened with a little vinegar, until they become translucent like a stained-glass window. Well sealed, they last until the thaw. Keeping summer in a jar—is that not, after all, what a poem does too?
Ingredients
- •Firm orchard apples — a full basket (fruit)
- •Sugar — in generous parts (preservation, sweetness)
- •Cider vinegar — a little (acidity, preservation)
- •Cinnamon, cloves — a few sticks and buds (spices)
How it was made : Before refrigeration, fruits and vegetables were 'put up' with sugar, vinegar, or salt to last through winter. Spiced apples, lined up on cellar shelves, accompanied roasted meats in the cold season.
Sources : Lydia Maria Child, The American Frugal Housewife (1829) · 19th-century New England domestic preservation practices