Watermelon and cantaloupe conserves

It’s summer, the watermelon and cantaloupe season. Usually, watermelons are eaten fresh, but you can also make jam or conserves out of them. Since watermelons contain a lot of water, few people dare make jam out of them because it takes a long time, and the results are slim: one-two jars out of a watermelon weighing 3-4 kg.

România Internațional, 31.08.2014, 17:40

It’s summer, the watermelon and cantaloupe season. Usually, watermelons are eaten fresh, but you can also make jam or conserves out of them. Since watermelons contain a lot of water, few people dare make jam out of them because it takes a long time, and the results are slim: one-two jars out of a watermelon weighing 3-4 kg.

In order to prepare watermelon conserves you need, besides watermelon pulp, 1 kg of sugar and a lemon. Peel the watermelon, remove the seeds and dice it. Put the watermelon in a large pan with the sugar and leave to cool for two hours. Then place the pan over small heat and stir occasionally for the watermelon pieces not to stick to the bottom of the pan. Add the lemon, cut into thin slices, and leave it to simmer until the pieces of watermelon become transparent. You can also add vanilla essence. When the syrup becomes sticky remove the pan from the cooker and leave it to cool. Then put the conserve into jars. Because watermelon pulp conserves take long to make and the final result is just a few jars, some prefer conserves made out of watermelon peel. In this case, the white part of the peel is used and a thin layer of the red part, the green part being completely removed. The white peel must be diced and the recipe is similar to the one described earlier.

Cantaloupe is better for conserves because the amount of conserve resulted after processing is bigger. You need 5 kg of cantaloupe and 2 kg of sugar. Mix the cantaloupes sliced into cubes with the sugar and place in the pan. In contact with the sugar the cantaloupes start oozing, so, after a while, they are ready to place on low heat. Leave to simmer and after a while remove he cantaloupe cubes leaving the syrup to continue boiling until it gets sticky. In this way you avoid the cantaloupe cubes being crushed. You can add vanilla essence and mint leaves to taste. Once the syrup gets sticky you can place the cantaloupe cubes back into the pan, give it one more boil and then remove from the cooker. Enjoy!