Lemon Honey Jelly
Author: Jayla
Our family has made wild grape jelly using sugar for many years. Mom and I were pleasantly surprised how easy it is to substitute honey for sugar in jelly making. We both liked the taste of this recipe, adapted from honey.com, but Dad still prefers berry jellies. Actually, he said, "This jelly could ruin a good biscuit." Fortunately, the recipe requires a low time and ingredient investment, so it’s worth a try!
Step 1: Combine 2-1/2 cups local honey, 3/4 cup strained lemon juice, and 4 teaspoons lemon zest in a 6-quart saucepan. Over high heat, bring mixture to a rolling boil, stirring constantly.
Step 2: Quickly stir in 1 (3 oz) package of liquid pectin. Still stirring, boil mixture for 1 minute longer.
Step 3: Remove from heat. Skim off foam with a metal spoon.
Steps 4 & 5: Quickly pour jelly into 2 hot, pint jars, filling to 1/4 from tops (have an extra, smaller jar available in case you have an excess of liquid); wipe jar rims with a damp cloth. Cover immediately with metal lids and screw on bands.
Process jars in a water bath canner for 5 minutes.
Cool jars on a wire rack for 12 hours, or overnight.
We entered our cinnamon creamed honey and lemon honey jelly at the Family Camp Fair. The creamed honey placed third, and the jelly garnered "Best of Show!"
Tags: Beekeeping, Cooking, Honey
January 30th, 2011 at 10:30 pm
Thanks for the info – of course I don’t like to heat honey at all, but we did end up with some honey this year that was not raw. Have you tried making berry or fruit jellies using honey instead of sugar?
I wonder if berries would ever go bad if they were submerged in honey… I suspect they would raise the moisture content of the honey to the point that it could ferment?
I would think that dried fruit (or even just dried to about 15% moisture) submerged in honey would be very well preserved and make a nice chewy fruit topping like you would put on top of shortcake or something, and the fruit flavor would permeate the honey. Most importantly, it would retain the nutrition of the raw honey and the dried fruit.
January 30th, 2011 at 10:39 pm
By the way, congratulations on you prize-winning entries! We experienced participating in a honey show last fall and had some good results too. God bless!