How to pot roast quince
We hate peeling and coring quinces; it’s a dangerous endeavour. Those suckers are hard and it’s easy to slip and accidentally amputate some essential body part with a paring knife. So we love this Maggie Beer-inspired recipes to bits; you literally turf your unpeeled, uncored quinces into a dutch oven with a s%^&-ton of sugar, some water and a few aromatics. Then, you turf them into the oven and pretty much forget they exist for 8 hours. The results? Sticky, soft, fragrant, gorgeous and yes, very sweet quinces for virtually no effort at all. Sometimes, that’s exactly our idea of cooking.
1. Preheat your oven to 150˚C. Grab about 10 quinces, or as many as will fit in a large casserole or another large oven-proof baking dish. Your quinces should smell fragrant; this means they’re ripe. Wash them to remove any fluffy stuff on the skin. No peeling necessary.
2. Pack them into the casserole in a single layer.
3. Scatter over 1kg caster sugar, 750ml-1 litre (3-4 cups water), a few strips of lemon zest with the white pith removed, a cinnamon stick if you like (not essential) and the juice of the lemon. (You can use orange instead of lemon; no biggie).
Stick the lid on (if your vessel is lidless, just use a piece of tight-fitting foil).
Shove them in the oven and let them bake. For ages. Go do some gardening or clean your car. After 2 hours, they’ll look like this. Kind of unpromising but they’re only 25% there. Stick with them.
At the halfway mark, your quinces will look like this. Still not very promising but trust the process. Remove the lid, turn them over, return them to the oven, then cook for another 4 hours. Go shampoo the dawg.
It’s been 8 hours, your quinces are ready and smell how clean your pooch and car are! The fruit is deep ruby red and the syrup has formed a jellied goo so thick, you can spread it on your toast. Yum. Cool the quinces down, then serve them with cream, ice cream or custard. Bake them into a crumble or cake, or eat them for breakfast with yoghurt. Slice, then serve them with cheese. Store them in the fridge and eat them within 5 days.