Dry preserve (entremets and gift of value)
Quince Paste (Cotignac)
PreservingDocumented🍯 🍋moyen1h30 (+ 24-48 h drying)
A dense, translucent quince paste, cooked long with sugar until it can be cut and stored. Sweet, tart, perfumed with quince.
Dry preserve (entremets and gift of value)
A dense, translucent quince paste, cooked long with sugar until it can be cut and stored. Sweet, tart, perfumed with quince.
Do you know cotignac, that quince paste with which the good towns present me when I make my entry? It is cooked and recooked with sugar — that sugar my Italian friends work so skillfully — until it sets and can be cut like a jewel. I keep it in my coffers for the long journeys of my court, and I willingly offer a piece to those who know how to please me. Taste: it is sweet and tart at once, just like the love of subjects for their prince.
Ingredients
- •Ripe quinces — a good quantity (fruit, base)
- •Sugar (or honey) — as much as pulp (preservation and sweetness)
- •Quince cooking water — a little (cooking liquid)
How it was made : Before cheap sugar, fruits were preserved by long cooking with sugar or honey: these "dry preserves" kept for months and traveled well. The cotignac of Orléans, famous since the Middle Ages, was traditionally offered to kings during royal entries.
Sources : Nostradamus, Traité des fardements et confitures (1555) · Platine en françois (1505)