Ripe Melon Preserve. A Very Old Cape Recipe

Ingredients:

8 lbs. of Sugar, boiled with the same quantity of Water into a Syrup clarified with an Egg.

6 lbs. of Melon, ripe, 1 oz. of White Ginger.

Take a large ripe melon (not too soft); cut into large slices; prick with a fork, peeling the slices very thinly and removing the seeds. Lay the pieces in a basin, cover with cold water, in which is a teaspoonful of salt, and put a plate on the top to keep the pieces under water. Let it remain in water four or five days; then wash it carefully; put the fruit into boiling water, and let it boil up once; lay the slices of melon on a cloth to drain. Now boil the syrup, and pour it boiling hot on the slices of melon, repeating this process every morning for a week; the last two days put the slices of melon in the preserving pot in which you heat the syrup, and let it boil gently for ten minutes or more, then let it cool. Repeat the next day, and go on till the fruit is quite clear and firm, and the syrup nice and thick. This process diminishes the syrup greatly, and you might make a little more if necessary. This mode of making preserve is rather tedious, but repays one for the trouble; it will keep for years, and becomes beautifully clear and quite firm. (The ginger to be put in a muslin bag, and boiled with the preserve, and taken out the last thing.)

Melon Preserve

Made in the same way, only take green melons, while the water melon peel preserve should be from a ripe one.