The Meyer lemon tree in my living room is just a scrawny thing about a foot tall. Now that it's winter, the leaves are falling off. But it produced 9 lovely green fruit. I used two to flavour some applesauce made with the skins (so good and much faster to make).
To do justice to the 7 remaining lemons, I decided to make marmelade. The recipes I found on line seemed really complicated, so I worked out a plan that turned out really well.
1. cut Meyer lemons very thin, removing seeds as you go. Chop into small pieces
2. take the zest off one lemon and two oranges. Cut into thin ribbons.
3. cut fruit in half, and cut between the membranes. Remove the fruit.
4. I ended up with 3.5 cups.
5. place in large pot. Add the same amount of water as fruit.
6. bring to boil, and simmer gently 30 minutes.
7. add same amount of sugar as fruit. Stir till dissolved.
8. boil hard 10 minutes. Check for set: put a small plate in the freezer. Put a bit of jam on the plate. The jam should set within 20 seconds. If it is still runny, continue to boil 10 more minutes, and test again. Take off the heat and stir for 5 minutes to prevent floating fruit.
9. Bottle the jam: wash pint mason jars. Place in a roasting pan filled half full of hot water. Put in the oven at 200 degrees. always use new lids. Bring to the boil, then turn off heat.
10. Bottle the jam, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Screw on jar rims finger tight, and set on kitchen towel. Do not disturb for 12 hours.
The jam is bursting with citrus flavour, and not too sweet.
I have done justice to my beautiful meyer lemons!
