Top with alternate layers of melon and sugar.

The next day, place a two-shilling piece (the precursor to the 20-cent piece but with a higher silver content) at the bottom of the preserving pan with the juice of the lemons. The recipe advises dicing the melons and leaving them to stand overnight with 8lb of the sugar. There are 2.2 pounds to a kilogram, so this recipe uses lots of sugar and melon produces a huge amount of jam. For those without imperial weights and measures at their fingertips, the measurement “lb” represents pounds. One calls for “21lb citron melon, 21lb sugar, juice of 8 lemons, 3 jars of preserved ginger”. My slightly faded copy of The Presbyterian Cookery Book - an Australian cookbook first published in 1895 but revised in 1950 by a Mrs McCallum - has several detailed recipes for melon jam. They are often combined with other fruits such as lemon, orange, passionfruit, pineapple, berries and ginger to produce a more strongly flavoured jam. They make a sweet, transparent golden jam that sets easily due to their high pectin content. This summer she plans to grow her own in her Tasmanian garden.Īlso called citron melons, jam melons are small and round with striped green skin and white flesh studded with reddish brown seeds. Keen to keep the customers happy, Liz tried to source locally produced jam melons without luck.

It was popular in the 1930s, 40s and 50s at a time when it and other easy-to-grow crops such as choko and Jerusalem artichoke were often found in backyard veggie patches. It seems melon jam, which is made from a watermelon relative called jam melon, has sentimental appeal to many older Australians.

My friend Liz Gower, aka The Jam Lady, who makes lots of jams and preserves to sell at local markets, found she was being asked frequently for melon jam. Like the choko, this hardy, prolific melon has a sentimental place in Australian folklore

Ginger brave transparent