Gooseberries

Press, 2 December 1981, Page 18

Gooseberries

Alison Hoist’s

Food Facts

Four years ago. when I wrote a gooseberry recipe for my Kitchen Diary, we had just planted 10 gooseberry bushes. While the bushes got established we picked token crops. Last November we were not in New Zealand. to see how big a crop we had, but this year we are enjoying the fruits of our labours. Whether you grow your own gooseberries or buy them ready to use, you may find this column useful. L. Gooseberries for cooking should be picked' when young, immature, green and firm. Soft, ripe gooseberries should be used as a dessert fruit’only — the skins of ripe gooseberries are too bitter to use for cooking. Half-ripe fruit are not good for cooking nor for eating raw. Immature gooseberries freeze well. They should be topped and tailed, then packed in plastic bags, in meal-sized quantities. After thawing the frozen gooseberries seem to have less acidity. In contrast, bottled gooseberries always seem sourer than the fresh fruit — so botie them only if your freezer is completely full. A two-litre ice-cream container holds eight cups of gooseberries. This amount weighs about a kilogram, so two cups of gooseberries weigh about 250 g. To stew gooseberries, use % cup water and ’A cup sugar with each 2 cups of gooseberries. Remember that the berries will keep cooking after the pot is removed from the heat. If you want to reduce the acidity of stewed gooseberries you can try cooking them with a small amount of chopped fresh angelica —not the shiny green florist’s variety), or wave a couple of sprays of elderflower around in the syrup before you add the gooseberries. Both these additions are interesting. Both modify the gooseberry -flavour slightly, but they certainly reduce the acidity of the berries though

I cannot work out the reason for this. Stewed gooseberries taste very good when spooned over slices of unfilled sponge or slices of. raspberry filled sponge roll. (These" sponges freeze well and may be cut while frozen.) Stewed gooseberries are good with meusli and yoghurt or cream, too. • s I make a thickened smooth gooseberry mixture rather like lemon honey. I keep it in the refrigerator for several weeks, since I find it useful tb spread between sponge layers to make quick layer cakes between now and Christmas. Rather than keep this mixture too long, I freeze 500 gram bags of gooseberries to cook for puree gooseberrygateaux later in the summer. • To make the filling, stew 500 g of topped and tailed gooseberries with Vi cup of water. When mushy, push through a sieve or puree in a food processor. Mix with I‘A cups sugar and 3 eggs, then stir this mixture into 50g of butter, melted in a large saucepan or frying pan. Stir over moderate heat until mixture bubbles and thickens, then remove from heat and colour brighter green with food colourings if desired. Pour into ' clean screwtopped jars and refrigerate until needed (up to 3-4 weeks). . Try this mixture in cooked sweet shortcrust tart’ cases, too, or spread it on a pavlova. For cooked gooseberry puddings, gooseberry pie is hard to beat, although gooseberry sponge, with a plain or spiced topping, is popular too. ’ Gooseberries are high in acid and pectin, so makes jam which sets easily. Gooseberries are often used with strawberries in jam-making since the flavours blend well, and since strawberries. alone make very soft jam. Last but not least — if you are making Christmas mincemeat and have raw, unripe gooseberries handy, you can use them minced with the dried fruit,. instead of using apples.