Fail-Bomb: Fruit Jellies

For Valentine's Day, I like to go over the top on dessert. I made my Traditional Chocolate Cake after someone called in their reward from a bet (long story) and that's always a hit because the entire cake is homemade (no Duncan Hines here!). The icing can be found in the 1971 version of "The Joy of Cooking", I'll share it here sometime.

As cool as that was, I wanted something new to try. After a little searching, I found a candy recipe from Southern Living magazine that produced pretty red and pink fruit jellies that was creatively titled "Sugared Jelly Candies."

Wow, this recipe did not in any way turn out like I had planned. I appreciate websites like Delish.com for their seemingly endless supply of fun recipes, but this one has NOT been tested in a kitchen by a sane human being. For one thing, the recipe took 2 hours and then some. The description from Southern Living claimed that it took, "...only an hour to make the base...," but I was pretty sure I spent two hours and then some boiling and shoving fruit through a sieve. The recipe is as follows, with snarky notes in red:

Base For All Flavors

• 1 pound(s) (about 2 large) Granny Smith apples, quartered and cored---peel or don't peel, doesn't matter to the writer of this fine recipe!
• 1 pound(s) (about 2) pears, quartered and cored
• 2/3 cup(s) white wine, such as chardonnay---you'll need some too when you start shoving fruit
• 1/2 cup(s) granulated sugar
• 1 teaspoon(s) powdered pectin
• 1 cup(s) sanding sugar, substitute granulated sugar

Spiced Jellies

• 1 1/2 cup(s) granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup(s) fresh lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon(s) cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon(s) ground clove
• 1/4 teaspoon(s) nutmeg

Raspberry Jellies

• 1 cup(s) granulated sugar
• 3/4 cup(s) seedless raspberry jam
• 1/4 cup(s) lemon juice

Lemon Jellies

• 1 (lemon peel) peel and flesh with pith removed
• 2 tablespoon(s) fresh ginger, chopped
• 1 1/2 cup(s) granulated sugar
• 1 1/2 cup(s) lemon juice

Directions

Prepare the Fruit: Line the bottom of a square 9-inch pan with parchment paper. Lightly oil the parchment paper and set aside. Place the apples, pears, and wine in a medium-sized saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.For Lemon Jellies: Add the peel and flesh from 1 lemon and ginger to the saucepan.

Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer, stirring occasionally, until softened -- 15 to 20 minutes. Run the fruit through a food mill, discard the solids, and transfer the mixture to a clean saucepan.---This step is so much harder than you think. For one thing, who has a food mill? It's not 1950's and Grandma isn't canning relish. Since I lacked this vital tool, I substituted a blender and a sieve. Did this work? Sort of......

1. It's very hard to pour steaming hot alcoholic fruit mash into a tiny blender. Screaming was involved when some fell on my arm. Not all of the mash fit into the blender, so two batches were needed.

2. When it came to sieveing out the solids, the labor was tedious. I placed a sieve over a bowl, flopped some blended mash into it, and used a spatula to shove the pulp over and over again into the mesh, which resulted in fruit paste of the consistancy of baby food. This had to be done 5 times. 5 different batches. Ugh.

Make the Candy: Combine 1/2 cup granulated sugar and the pectin in a small bowl and set aside. Add the remaining ingredients, depending upon the flavor you are making, to the puréed fruit. For Raspberry Jellies: Add the granulated sugar, raspberry jam and lemon juice. For Spiced Jellies: Add the sugar, lemon juice, cinnamon, clove and nutmeg.

Simmer over medium heat until slightly thickened -- about 15 minutes. Remove the pan from heat and whisk in the sugar-pectin mixture.

Increase heat to medium high and continue to whisk until all of the sugar is dissolved -- about 2 minutes. Whatever Southern Living, this part should be done for at least 5 extra minutes to really take that liquid off. Bring the mixture to a boil and pour into the prepared pan. Place the pan on a cooling rack and let sit uncovered for 24 hours or until set.----Wait a whole 24 hours, it's just better that way. Poke it to check. Does it feel thick and slightly hard to the touch? Perfect.

Unmold the Jellies: Lightly dust a 12-inch piece of parchment paper with granulated sugar and set aside. Loosen the edges of the set jelly with a knife, invert onto the parchment, and let set for another 24 hours. ----This is where the weeping started. After spending 2 hours preparing my base and fruit, the jelly flopped onto the parchment not with a fleshy thump of well-set pectin, but with a wet SPLOOSHHH. I dropped some choice words, poked the mass with my finger, dropped some additional words, and wondered where I went wrong.

At this point jellies can be wrapped in parchment paper and plastic wrap and stored in the refrigerator for up to 3 weeks or until ready to serve.---No Southern Living, they will not be ready to serve because the recipe didn't work. For some reason, due to either operator error or lack of complete instruction, the jellies did not set as they were supposed to do.

Cut out the candies: Use a knife to cut 1-inch by 1-inch squares or use a small cookie cutter to cut out shapes from the jelly.Dredge each piece in sanding sugar and transfer to a wire rack to dry -- about 24 hours. Store jellies covered with plastic wrap for up to 1 week.

All in all, the candies were waaay too much work for what resulted, if the results had performed as planned. This is not a recipe I would attempt again by any measure.