Quince

November 2, 2015 • Category: Pantry, Dessert

It is quince season. I’d be totally disingenuous if I typed that I loved quinces. Even though I am fond of all my memories associated with my grandmother, her yearly ritual of making quince jam was not that special to me. It seemed like a lot of trouble for a paltry result. It was however a ritual every Fall and the kitchen would be filled with busy hands peeling, and stirring the huge copper pot to make the quince jam.
Nevertheless, the sight of the trees in the orchard with their magnificent golden knobbly fruits compelled me to reconsider my very lukewarm feelings. First of all, let me bring back satisfactory attempts at using them in the past. One of them was of course, the traditional preserve. Another was a quince stew. I made a simple compote, a recipe gleaned in one of Claudia Roden’s books, that I made, and it came out fine. Finally, I tried something creative, making a red lentil spread with quince and caramelized onions, which was gone in minutes.

My next project is to make quince paste; the Mexican kitchen has traditionally used quinces to make quince paste, called ate de membrillo. Once that challenge is met, I will make doughnuts from Nice called barbajuans which is a brioche dough stuffed with a lump of quince paste and fried. I will post these attempts as they materialize, of course.