Golden Citrus Jam

China-grown mandarin oranges 🍊 are only available at the beginning of the year, or during lunar New Year.  In other words, mandarin orange can only meet up its citrus counterparts during this time of the year.

I gathered my very first mandarin orange for this year, with a Sunkist naval orange, and a lemon together. And brewed them into a small cup of yummy golden citrus jam 🍯

Yield: 235g jam

Ingredients

1 large naval orange

1 large mandarin orange

1 medium lemon

80~100g raw sugar*

10g rock sugar/golden syrup, optional

* The amount of sugar added depending on the sweetness of the fruits, used as well as your preference.

Directions

1. Wash the skin of the fruits with vegetable & fruit wash to remove any residual pesticides.

2. Cut the orange into segments. Slice away the white pith and keep the orange peel. For the orange segments, remove all the seeds. Keep the pith and seeds for extracting the pectin later. Set aside.

I collected 140g of orange segments, and 6g of orange peel.

3. Repeat the same procedure for the Mandarin orange. 

I collected 125g of orange segments and 9g of orange peel.

4. Cut the lemon into halves, and extract the juice. I collected 30ml of lemon juice.

5. Julienned all the orange peel.

Dice all the orange segments. Keep the cut-size small so the jam would not to be too chunky.

6. Put all the discarded fruit peels, pith and seeds (about 220g) into a pot. And add in about 160ml of water. Heat at low temperature without boiling them. The purpose is to extract the pectin from these parts. 

Stop heating when the liquid turns cloudy and slightly thicken.

Filter the mixture and keep the liquid.

7. In a clean pot, add all the diced orange segments, julienned peel, raw sugar, pectin extract,

and lemon juice.

Bring to a constant boil and stir regularly to evaporate the liquid  faster. When the mixture starts to thicken, reduce the temperature and stir constantly.

Add in the rock sugar, if you're adding. The rock sugar would give the jam a glossy looks.

The jam is ready when your spatula can cut a clear path through the middle of the jam.

8. Transfer the hot jam to a clean and dry glass container.

Cover the opening with a plastic food and invert the container. Let the jam cool down in this position.

I kept the jam in the fridge after it has cooled down 😋