Extracting juice for jelly
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You need
- A large saucepan, wide rather than deep
- A jelly bag or several layers of damp cheesecloth
- A stand or a chair back to hang the bag from
- A bowl that fits under it
The steps
Extraction decides whether a jelly is clear, and clarity is most of what a customer is paying for in a jelly rather than a jam. Everything below is about getting juice out without getting anything else out with it.
- Put the prepared fruit in a large saucepan with the water the recipe specifies for that fruit. The quantity is per fruit and is in the guide table, not a general rule.
- Bring to a boil.
- Simmer for the time given for that fruit, until the fruit is soft, stirring to prevent scorching.
- Pour into a damp jelly bag and let it drip. Do not press it.
Why not to press the bag
This is the instruction people override and it is the one that turns a clear jelly cloudy. Pressing increases yield and carries pulp through with the juice, and the two cannot be separated afterwards.
Pressing raises the yield and drives fine solids into the juice, which is one of the named causes of cloudy jelly. The choice is between more juice and clearer juice, and on a product sold in clear glass the clarity is usually worth more than the extra cup.
Stirring is in the instruction for a reason
It looks like a detail in the published steps and it is doing real work, specifically in how evenly the fruit gives up what it has. Fruit sitting still in a pan extracts from the outside in, and the inside of the mass never gets there. The published steps say to stir for that reason rather than out of habit.
Scorching is local overheating at the bottom of the pan, and the flavor it produces cannot be removed. It is one of the two causes of a preserve that does not taste of the fruit.
What will not work
Commercially canned or frozen juice. The guide rules it out and gives the reason: the pectin content is too low. That is on why commercial juice will not set.