Spiced Apple Cider Jelly

Say hello to autumn in a jar: this gem-like jelly is made from fresh pressed sweet apple cider, fragranced with fall spices, and water-bath canned so you can enjoy a taste of fall all-year round (but you can also make this small-batch recipe and refrigerate it instead!)

Fresh apple cider is my new favorite fall indulgence, and this jelly uses that pure liquid gold to make a lightly-spiced and pectin-set apple jelly, a perfect pairing with cheese on your next charcuterie board, as a flavorful glaze for meat or poultry, dolloped on crispy potato latkes, or even swirled onto yogurt or vanilla ice cream like a reverse a-la-mode.

This low-sugar recipe is made with Pomona’s pectin, which uses calcium to set rather than sugar. For that reason we’re able to use a mere 1/4-1/2 cup of sugar, and that’s more for flavor than anything (a little bit of sugar greatly enhances the natural apple flavor of the cider).

(Don’t forget to scroll to the bottom of the post to download the cozy, autumn-inspired printable labels!)

I’ll admit I’ve never been a fan of apple juice, even as a kid. Apples? Sure. But for some reason the juice never did it for me.

But apple cider is far and above better than apple juice. It’s what apple juice wishes it was. And seeing that the good stuff is usually only available for a few short weeks each fall, I’m making the most of apple cider season this year (would you believe we’ve already gone through almost 2 gallons of it between recipe testing for this and another recipe, and just drinking it by the glass).

This recipe uses fresh pressed apple cider, sometimes called sweet cider or soft cider, not to be confused with alcoholic hard cider. I’m talking about the refrigerated kind you get from your local apple orchard or farmer’s market during apple season and only during apple season. This kind of cider is unfiltered and more intensely apple-y than regular apple juice, and is usually unpasteurized so it needs to be refrigerated.

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from Love and Olive Oil https://ift.tt/irURoal