Johannisbeergelee {Redcurrant Jelly}

Yes, this is not really a dessert. But you can use it for many desserts. I often use jam or jelly as a filling for cakes or pastries. And I never made my own. I always thought it was much too difficult for me. But everyone who makes their own jam tells me that it is easy. So I tried it. I used redcurrants because I think that redcurrant jelly is a German thing. But I heard it is very popular in france, too. Is redcurant jelly common where you live? Or what other jams and jellies do you have that are uncommon in other countries or regions?Making this jelly was indeed much easier than I thought. You just have to boil the berries and then cook the juice with sugar. In Germany we use a special gelling sugar for our jams and jellies. It contains pectin (also acid and a preservative) and makes gelling very easy. There are different kinds, I used the one where you add one part of sugar to two parts of fruits. If you don’t have this kind of sugar you can make redcurrant jelly by using equal parts of sugar and fruits and by cooking the mixture a bit longer. (To see if the mixture has cooked long enough, pour a little bit of it onto a spoon and wait until cooled. Check the consistency.) Again, I only made a tiny amount. You can easily double or triple the recipe. (The original recipe calls for 1.3 kilogram of fruit and 500 g of gelling sugar.) To give this a little twist I added a small rosemary stalk to every glass of jelly.

Johannisbeergelee (makes 2-3 small glasses)

I used this recipe but made only one third of the quantity.

500 g (17.6 oz) redcurrants
100 ml water
200 g (1 cup) gelling sugar 2:1 or 400 g regular sugar
1 teaspoon tartaric or citric acid powder
1 stalk rosemary per glass

Remove the stems and place the berries in a large pot. Add water and bring to a boil. Cook covered for 5 minutes. Strain the juice and place in a measuring cup. You should get about 300 ml of juice. Add enough water so that the mixture measures 350 ml. Pour into a pot and add sugar plus acid. Boil for 5 minutes. If you use regular sugar boil for 10 minutes. Pour into sterilized glasses. Add rosemary and seal the glasses. Let cool completely.