We had a great time the other day collecting dandelions to try our hand at making jelly! I have had a recipe for Dandelion Jelly in my "want to try" file for several years now! My friend decided to make it and it came out yummy so we were off together to make another batch (or 3)! It was a beautiful day and the kids really enjoyed gathering the flowers and running through the field!
We then all went home to face the important task of cutting the flower petals away from the green stem so that none of the milky white stuff ended up in our jelly ( it is very bitter).
The kids were such great helps! They cut and cut and cut!!! They had a blast pretending to have a dandelion barber shop!
Even Emmy sat and diligently snipped away.
The jelly came out tasting so yummy! Like a lemon honey!! Here is the recipe that we adapted from
this one at Recipe Zaar:
Dandelion JellyIngredients: - 8 cups of lightly packed dandelion petals (use only yellow petals and very little green or the milk in the stems will make the jelly bitter)
- 4 tablespoons lemon juice
- 7 cups sugar
- 1 (1 3/4 ounce) package pectin
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Directions:Start by steeping the petals in 7 cups of boiling water for 2 hours, or try the quicker method of boiling for 10 minutes and then let the mixture cool. We used the longer method. When done strain the mixture using cheesecloth. You need to have 6 cups of liquid. In a deep kettle bring to a rolling boil the liquid, the lemon juice, and the pectin. Add sugar then stir and boil hard for 1 1/2 minutes, or until mixture
sheets from a metal spoon. Remove from heat and add vanilla. Pour into hot clean half pint jelly jars and seal. We flipped the jars onto the lid for 10 minutes to seal them and it worked great! This should make about 9 half pint jars.
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