JUICING THE POMEGRANATES

Before you make anything, you'll have to juice the pomegranates. You should find someone with a tree because it'd be too expensive to buy enough pomegranates. To pick them, bring a pair of small shears and wear a heavy jacket to protect your arms against the thorns.

I asked around on our local Sacramento Usenet newsgroup if anyone had a tree. A kind man offered his tree. It had large pomegranates with large juice seeds. He's first on my list for a jar of jelly.

Use a spoon to scoop out the pomegranate seeds. Place them in a jelly or cloth bag and squeeze out the juice. Strain the juice through a second cloth bag or a jelly bag. If you don't have enough juice for your recipe, add a bit of water to the leftover pulp.

Paula Woolfert in the *Cooking of the Eastern Mediterranean* recommends against reaming the pomegranates because the white parts are bitter. She puts the seeds into a cheesecloth and squeezes them by hand.

In the November ‘95 Saveur magazine, it’s recommended to roll the pomegranates around to soften it up inside, poking a hole in it, and then squeezing the juice through the hole.

You can freeze the pomegranate seeds.

POMEGRANATE JELLY

4 cups of pomegranate juice
7 1/2 cups of sugar
2 to 4 Tbsp of lemon juice (depending on the sweetness of the fruit)
1 bottle of liquid pectin (you can use the recipe on the bottle of commercial pectin to make jelly)

Have your canning jars ready.

Measure juice, lemon juice and sugar into a large sauce pan and mix. Bring to boil over hottest heat and at once add the liquid pectin and stir constantly. Bring to a rolling boil and boil for exactly 30 seconds.

Skim, pour quickly into hot sterilized jars, and seal.

Process in boiling water bath for 5 min.

Makes about 11 (8 ounce) jars

POMEGRANATE SYRUP

Measure equal parts of pomegranate juice and sugar and let it stand for three days. Bring to a boil, simmer 5 minutes, strain, pour into sterilized jars, and seal. Don’t forget the hot water bath.

The syrup may be used diluted with cold water to taste (I usually do a four to one ratio for fruit syrups) and served over ice. It's splashed over grapefruit and used in some cocktails. I suppose it would be wonderful over vanilla ice cream and so on.