Frost nip and other sundries

You know it's been a rough winter when Minnesotans can't bring themselves to discuss the weather anymore. I'm tempted to throw a "F*ck It's Freezing" Party where we drink hot cocoa, play board games, watch bad movies, and maybe even whimper a little bit.

But take heart: it's February on Saturday, and at some point in February there's almost always bring a brief and temporary thaw. So that's something!

It actually warmed up a bit this past Friday, so Andy and I packed up ye olde snowmobile and head down the trail to one of the large lakes in the area. Of course, temps in the 20s just meant the wind was howling as the next batch of frigid blew in. I'd never actually been on this particular lake before and it was a nice change of scenery.  We'll be back, maybe even when the wind isn't blowing 30 mph.

We didn't stay long enough to catch anything. I was hot to trot to get home to make a batch of boeuf bourguignon. As it was, the infamous beef stew wasn't ready until well after 8 p.m., but it was well worth the wait and I feel that Julia would approve of us eating European style (aka, real late). 

I had my first real brush with frostbite on a brief snowmobile ride in -12 temps on a windy lake on Tuesday. It's just frostnip really, which nipped at my cheek and bridge of my nose through a leaky snowmobile helmet visor. I'm familiar with the warm burn of windburn on winter evenings after a day outside, but whereas windburn kind of makes you feel alive, the sting of frostnip is a humbling reminder of just how deadly cold can be.

That said, when I was a little girl playing hockey on an outdoor rink, I used to come into the warming house at the end of a game and sit crossed legged on the bench after taking off my skates, trying to warm up my painfully cold, bright pink toes and not cry. The frostnip pictured above did not make me clutch my cheek and softly sob, so it really wasn't that bad. 

Turns out, frostnip feels a lot like sunburn and by Wednesday morning, it was kind of itchy. A friend suggested I put honey on it, but I had visions of sticking to everything I touched if I did that, so I opted for some dabs of Smith's Rosebud Salve throughout the day instead. Really just glorified petroleum jelly, one of Andy's coworker's dad's company packages Rosebud Salve, which is how we ended up with a tin of it. We've actually had it for a few years and I wasn't sure what to do with it, but lately have been using it as lip balm, and now, frostnip salve. The tin describes the salve as "all purpose skin preparation," which "aids in the relief of chapped skin, diaper rash, blemishes, detergent burns, and rough cuticles, and it softens rough hands." They sell it at Antropologie, so you know it's cool.

On a warmer note, I made my annual batches of marmalade over the weekend - a batch of Triple Citrus (grapefruit, lemon, and orange) and Meyer Lemon. Making marmalade is exceedingly tedious and at almost every step of process (but especially when you're in the midst of supreming 12 citrus fruits which takes forever) you wonder why you bother. Then you see those jars of processed marmalade lined up and it's like you've bottled up sunshine - in the throes of January no less - and suddenly it's all worth it. Plus it tastes pretty good, even if my Triple Citrus got a little gummy. 

Don't laugh, but I actually planted a few Meyer lemon seeds in the pot above. It felt so good to touch dirt. We'll just see if they decide to sprout. . . Meyer lemon marmalade with homegrown lemons in as few as six years, you guys! ;)

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Marmalade Season

I knew about marmalade long before I tasted it. My mother used the word "marmalade" to explain to her piano students how to count out triplets in 6/8 time signature. 

"Mar-ma-lade, mar-ma-lade, mar-ma-lade."

But never having heard very nice things about the taste of marmalade (it was bitter, they told me) I stuck with my sweet, fruity, Sure-Jell thickened jams for years after learning its existence. Occasionally, I'd glance at the Smuckers Orange marmalade on the grocery store shelves and wonder what the heck jam made out of citrus tasted like.

I found out at a London breakfast table where, in the basement dining room of a bed and breakfast, I discovered orange marmalade was the only preserve available to spread on my toast. I spread a tentative blob on a corner of toast and apprehensively took a bite. It was bitter, but then sweet, and actually quite refreshing. There was something very nice about how the bitter citrus peel in the marmalade blended with the creamy, sweet butter spread across a crispy, nearly room temperature piece of whole grain toast.

I stopped fearing marmalade after that first taste and actually came to look forward to finding it at the breakfast table for the rest of that week. But back Stateside, I felt no desire to keep a jar of marmalade in the fridge. There was something awfully romantic about smearing orange marmalade on your toast to start off a day of touring London and honestly, I wasn't sure it would taste as good back home.    

I never thought of making my own marmalade until last year when I noticed a recipe for orange marmalade on the Sure-Jell packet. Then I discovered Marisa McCellan's recipe for three citrus marmalade last January and I knew I had to try it.

In the midst of January, when I'm pretty sure nothing will ever grow again, it's lovely to fill your home with the smell of citrus. It reminds me of far off places - both places where the sun shines and citrus trees grow, and also the orangeries of England where the well-to-do kept potted citrus plants centuries ago. (Fyi: the orangery at Kensington Palace is now a lovely little tea house if you're ever in Kensington and fancying a pot of tea and slice of Victoria Sponge Cake.) I highly recommend making marmalade on days where the temperature's not predicted to rise past zero. It's a wonderful escape.

Three-Citrus Marmalade made with lemons, navel oranges, and white grapefruit

Making marmalade's quite the process - plan on it taking more time then seems humanly possible. It's best to use organic fruit since you use the peels and you really don't want nasty chemicals (or wax) in your marmalade. First you wash your fruit and peel it. The peeled fruit must be supremed (where you remove all of the fruit from its membranes) and the seeds removed. The diced peels get simmered for a half hour or so until they're tender and then peels get combined with sugar, the citrus fruit and juice, and some of the water  from cooking the peels. Then just boil that all until it reaches the gelling point and can it. Simple enough, but last Wednesday I started making marmalade at noon and didn't finish up until 8 at night. (There were some interruptions, I'll admit, such as climbing on top of the roof to melt out the bathroom vent.)

I've been anticipating this year's marmalade for a while now because the marmalade I made last January was gone by May and because I had a beautiful new maslin pan to test out. The maslin pan is specially designed for making jam and marmalade. It has a handle, a pour spout, and a thick bottom to evenly distribute the heat.

My lucky marmalade got to take two trips through the maslin pan because someone wasn't patient enough when waiting for the marmalade to hit the set point and the first go around I canned what was essentially citrus syrup. (Lesson learned.)

Speaking of which, does anyone have any tips about when to stop cooking marmalade to achieve the proper set? Last year's batch was most definitely overcooked (as in it was a couple steps away from being hard candy) but still edible. This year's did end up setting quite nicely, but I feel like my marmalade doesn't reach a set I like until it's sustaining 224 F. (It should set at 220F.) Anyone? Anyone? The saucer test doesn't seem to work for me. I feel like I could drop little dabs of the cooked marmalade onto frozen saucers until the cows come home and I still can't tell exactly what the marmalade's consistency will be once it's completely cooled.

Despite the frustrations, I'm so happy to have marmalade back in my pantry. I still like it best on buttered (but slightly cooled) toast, but you can also throw a dollop in with sauteed chicken, soy sauce, ginger and Sriracha to make an orange chicken stir-fry. If I can find tangerines, I may be trying out a tangerine vanilla marmalade in the near future from Elizabeth Field's Marmalade book. Apparently I've become something of a marmalade nut.

Do you like the taste of marmalade?

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