Orange marmalade

My nana is crazy about orange marmalade. She’d eat it straight from the jar, but we normally manage to convince her to spread it onto a thin crispy slice of delicious brown German bread from the German bakery around the corner. I personally like it better on white toast, with a thin film of butter underneath. Mmmh, delicious. Anyway, I always make this for my nana for Christmas, and this year was no exception. Paired with a jar of my candied orange slices, it is the perfect side to my boring old present (I always get her a bottle of that amazing Pear Rose Nana perfume).

Ingredients:

550g worth of oranges – about 4

1 lemon

3 cups of water

1 kg granulated sugar – if you don’t want to add in orange slices, use pectinated sugar as all the pectin in this jam is coming from the orange peel!

Slice up 1 of the oranges in very very thin slices, with the peel on. Cut the rest in half, then spoon the pulp out in a big bowl with the slices: try to leave all the white peel on the orange with the peel. Add the juice of the lemon in the bowl with the rest. 

 If you really like to have bits of orange in your marmalade (and I do!), take one of the peels, remove the white peel for the inside and slice it up really thin, adding it to the mix. Add the sugar and leave the whole thing to rest for about 4 hours.

 Put the whole thing in a heavy saucepan, add the water and boil on low heat for about 1 hour (more or less according to the consistency you want your marmalade to have. I like it quite tough, so I go for 1 and ½ hours, but you can do it for less if you are more into a more spreadable consistency).

And there you go. Pour in your sterilised jars and you have the most adorable Christmas little gift. Add a cinnamon stick, a pretty red ribbon, an anise star and a branch of holly for the ultimate treat.

I also like to spread this on dark chocolate chip bread. Toasted, no butter, with a cold glass of milk. The kids love it, and so will you!