Pink Grapefruit Jelly

I have happy memories of eating pink grapefruit as a child that was first dabbed with butter, sprinkled with brown sugar and cinnamon, then heated to caramelization under the broiler. The tart and the sweet together brought such pleasure. So, working again with Christine Ferber's recipes, and with happy thoughts of grapefruit, I toured the farmer's market and settled on three pounds of pink grapefruit with a tart, slightly sweetish flavor.

Gathering ample Granny Smith apples, I prepared the apple pectin juice yesterday. This morning I washed the grapefruit and cut the pink halves into quarters. Squeezing the grapefruits proved to be a problem -- all I have is my yellow hand squeezer, not nearly big enough for these daddies. So I cut each grapefruit into eighths, enabling me to squeeze pieces, although grapefruit juice was squirting everywhere.

Six grapefruits delivered 2+ cups of, surprisingly, pale yellow juice. Following Ms. Ferber's instructions, I saved a paltry 12 seeds for the muslin bag. What a difference from my earlier Seville oranges! My muslin bag looked impoverished, and I was tempted to add some of the pulp and pith from the squeezed fruit to pad it out. Opting against it, I chose to see what 12 seeds could do.

With my zester, I traced a circular path around a good-looking grapefruit, poaching the lemony yellow strands until just tender in water and a pinch of salt.

I cut the strands into manageable lengths, then poured the sugar, grapefruit juice, apple pectin juice and lemon juice into my lovely copper preserving pan. In went my skimpy muslin bag. I followed Ms. Ferber's directions, boiling for 10 minutes, stirring, then pulling the bag.

Hmmm, this marmalade was not ready to jar. So stirring, stirring, testing, testing. I had numerous spoons in the freezer, kept checking. Finally, it frothed. While it was just slowing down from the froth one of my test spoons revealed it was wrinkling. In what felt like a mad dash, I laid out my jars and pan on the kitchen table and starting pouring the jam into jars. This recipe made a mere four 8-oz. jars.

The taste? Bitter, sweet, sour, all of it riding the tongue. Lovely though. I tried it on toast with butter -- no good. This is a jelly made for a dessert, perhaps on a cheesecake, or poured warm over ice cream, or lavished over a goat cheese or cream cheese. The piquant grapefruit flavor needs a creamy foil. I think it would be spectacular in a grapefruit caramel, or in a marinade with chicken. Lots of possibilities.

Although I was smart enough not to turn these jars over as soon as I filled them, I see that the jam itself has small bubbles in it -- an indication that I prematurely ended the cooking at the frothing stage. The grapefruit zest seems to have collected up top, another sign I ended too early. But the color is a lovely orange caramel, and, as I spooned up leftover puddles in the preserving pan, addictive in its flavor.

Next up: Orange with spices of Alsace