Blood Orange Cordial
The first time I made cordial it was a rather challenging experience. Thankfully I learned a couple of things. The first, mentally process any recipe and use common sense before actually breaking out the cookware. The second was to keep the amounts small.
We are a family of two adults with infrequent visitors. With items such as cordial that are not shelf stable I need to be mindful of ensuring the bottled product ends up in appropriately sized containers.
Last time I used a 700ml Passata Bottle, this amount would be great for a family as you probably would go through it in close to a week. In this household it took close to a month for each bottle to end up empty. Even thought I actually waterbath canned the end product to keep things safe, that length of time in the fridge is just asking for trouble.
This time I am using some 250ml bottles. Even for us this amount should never need to last more than a week, after it's defrosted, and in a lot of cases a matter of days. This is particularly important as we really don't like things super sweet, that means I am more often than not going to short the sugar on a recipe (and one of the main reasons you will probably never see a recipe for cordial up here). In some types of preservation that might not be so much of a problem but as sugar is the major bug suppression tool in a recipe like this it means I am trading off our personal taste against the amount of time it will stay good.
These small amounts also work well for us as A really likes a change more often than not. Rather than staring at the bottle wishing it to end after 250ml he can go shopping in the freezer and decide if it's lemon, lime or blood orange that tickles his fancy this round.
Preserving for a small household, where I have them available, I tend to stick with smaller jars for everything, except pasta sauce. It reduces our waste considerably as it allows us to get to the bottom of a jar before things go moldy or turn due to passion turning to disinterest.
What are your considerations when you are rummaging through your stash of jars?
6 comments:
I quickly found that preserving in smaller jars and bottles worked better for us too... with two adults and two fussy-eating children!
I learned to use smaller jars for many things as well. I also like the 4 and 8 oz jars for gift-giving. In the interest of making our next move easier, especially if we move into a much smaller place, I just down-sized my jar collection significantly. I got rid of a lot of pint and quart jars but nothing smaller than a pint.
Hi Dixiebelle,
I can certainly understand how it would also work under those circumstances too.
:-D
Belinda
Hi Chile,
I am almost getting to the point of a serious cull myself. At this point of the year it feels like I spend half my life moving jars around the kitchen.
Kind Regards
Belinda
Hi Belinda - The cordial looks delicious :-) I'm currently scooting around for a plum cordial recipe, as we're likely to be swimming in plums this summer. Should be fun!
Enjoy the cordial...yummmmmm!
Thanks Leanne,
I have a good friend with a plum tree so we may or may not be swimming ourselves. Last year we made asian plum sauce from them, not the best recipe so I will keep trying. If I end up with more, now I know it's either make cordial or buy cordial, I expect we will have plum cordial as well.
Kind Regards
Belinda
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