Honey-fermented Christmas quincemeat
While making a carrot cake-inspired honey fermented jam, featuring grated carrots mixed with sweet spices, dried fruit and citrus, someone remarked that you could apply the idea of fermenting ingredients in honey to Christmas mincemeat, thus leading me to the recipe below. You can spoon this mixture into prebaked pastry shells or simply dollop it onto drop scones with cultured (or brandy) cream, or even just have on toast, with yogurt or alongside a panna cotta. Makes approx. 200g
Method
Coarsely grate the quince or apple. Finely grate the ginger. Thinly slice the cobnuts or almonds. Mix the remaining ingredients together and spoon into a jar, ensuring you have a little headspace. Secure with a lid and let it ferment at room temperature for two weeks, shaking or stirring it every day or so to ensure you don’t get yeasts (which can lead to moulds growing) settling on the top.
Once fermented you can leave it out to ferment further, just ensuring you stir it every so often (as above), or store in the fridge. It will keep happily for weeks, if not months.
Ingredients
½ quince or 1 small apple
1 tsp freshly grated ginger
1 tbsp cobnuts or blanched almonds
½ tsp mixed spice
½ tsp ground cinnamon
A dusting of freshly grated nutmeg
1 tbsp dates
1 tbsp currants
1 tsp orange zest
1 tsp lemon zest
100g honey
If you like this recipe, you might like the following course...
Ferment the Seasons
Join our Fermentation guru Rachel de Thample and learn to transform seasonal ingredients into gut-friendly ferments.
Full details