Preparing a festive table is always a big responsibility for the hostess. Waiting for guests, a good housewife thinks through the menu in advance, chooses recipes for hot dishes and salads, snacks and pastries.
Often at the table, little gourmets will also have to please. It’s especially difficult to come up with a children's menu. Dishes should be not only tasty, but also beautiful in order to arouse interest in children and arouse their appetite.
The most difficult menu item may be dessert. A standard cake is interesting to kids only at the moment of blowing out the candles. And then the kids begin to get bored at the table, picking out a piece or two from the holiday cake. Ice cream and jelly with fruits can be a real salvation. The recipe for making jelly is very simple. Therefore, special attention should be paid precisely to the decoration of the dish.
A variety of fruits and berries can be used to make jelly. Citrus fruits will be especially appropriate: oranges, tangerines. Apples, pears, plums, apricots are also suitable. Especially tasty jelly is obtained with cherries, strawberries, currants and cranberries.
As a basis for dessert, you can use juice, either freshly squeezed or purchased. Compote or syrup from canned berries and fruits is perfect. Well, in jelly for adults, you can add wine and liquors. This will give a special piquancy to the dish.
Cooking jelly with fruits. Recipe
To prepare a dessert, the recipe can be changed depending on which fruits and berries are used.
General recommendations and proportions are as follows:
To prepare 5 servings of jelly from assorted fruits and berries we will need:
- Juice or compote (apple, raspberry, cherry) - 600 ml;
- 300 g of berries (you can use 3-4 species in equal proportions);
- 1 sachet of gelatin.
We breed gelatin in a small amount of juice or compote, we get a lot of gelatinous consistency. Then add the remaining juice or compote. You can add sugar if the selected juice is not sweet enough. We warm the liquid until the gelatin is completely dissolved. Then we distribute the fruits and berries in portioned glasses or in a bowl and pour the resulting syrup. Leave to cool in the refrigerator for 5 hours.
If you want to put the jelly on the saucers, then the shape needs to be slightly scalded, then the jelly will slip out with ease.
If you cook jelly only from apples, then you can not use gelatin at all or add quite a bit. This is due to the fact that apples are naturally rich in pectin. Pectin is a natural thickener. On the basis of it, for example, real apple natural marmalade is made. Naturally, if you are preparing dessert for the youngest guests, it is better to do without gelatin, or to minimize its quantity, and use apple juice. Apple juice just needs to be thoroughly boiled with sugar and allowed to cool.
Mandarin Jelly
Especially tasty and pungent is jelly with fruits, the recipe of which includes citrus fruits. Oranges or tangerines are best.
The tangerine pulp must be chopped and mixed with honey. Instead of juice, you can use canned tangerine syrup. And you can make a decoction of zest and pulp of mandarin, mix with gelatin and sugar. Pour the crushed pulp with the resulting broth and set to cool. In fruit jelly (a recipe for adults), you can add lemon or orange liquor.
Instead of molds and glasses, you can use a semicircular bowl of mandarin or orange skin, into which jelly is poured. By the way, such zest molds look very beautiful with contrasting jelly, for example, cherry.
Berry Jelly. Cranberry
Cranberry Jelly can be made not only tasty, but also very useful. To do this, prepare syrup with sugar, mix with gelatin, as indicated in the recipe, and then pour in fresh cranberry juice. Thus, all vitamins will be saved, and on the table you will have a surprisingly bright and healthy dessert.
With such wonderful desserts you can please not only children, but also adults who are indifferent to a sweet table.