Anyone following me on Twitter will already know of my rather dramatic courgette situation. On return from holiday we found 5 monster courgettes, all roughly 50cm in length and weighing around 6lbs. Willow is pictured struggling to hold one. I have to confess to being somewhat daunted by this embarassment of riches but nonetheless, a glut brings out the best in me to here goes.
Yesterday we had courgette pasta for lunch and nut roast with grated courgette for dinner and I reluctantly prepared Marguerite Patten's Marrow and Ginger jam (obviously replacing the marrow with monster courgette), a recipe I derided last year being, as I am, not a lover of marrow or ginger.
This is the recipe as it appears in Marguerite's book, I scaled it up 5 (yes, 5!) times. This recipe makes roughly 750g of jam.
Marrow and Ginger Jam.
1lb marrow/courgette, peeled, seeds removed and chopped to 1.5cm dice
3tbsp chopped crystalized ginger
1lb sugar
1 tbsp lemon juice
Mix the marrow, ginger and sugar in a pan and leave overnight. The sugar will draw a large amount of liquid from the marrow. Stir well to extract as much liquid as possible. From then on it's standard stuff, heat to setting point and pot into sterilised jars. As there are large pieces of marrow it's advisable to allow the jam to cook somewhat before potting up in a vain attempt to distribute the pieces evenly so they don't all float to the top. I'm useless at getting that bit to work though.
I'm surprised how nice it is. Rather sweet for my taste (I seem to have become accustomed to tart wild fruit) but pleasant enough. It's a delicate, summery preserve, sunshine yellow in colour and, as the bland courgette tones down the fire of the ginger, gently warming on the palate. Very breakfasty I feel.
So that's 2 monsters dealt with, 3 more to go. One more batch of pickle I think followed by courgette bake for tea, then I may resort to stocking the freezer with courgette puree for future soup use.
