Wash and destem grapes. Seperate skins and pulp by hand. Cook skins and pulp separately. Cook skins slowly until tender with just enough water to keep skins from sticking to pot. Cook pulp slowly until seeds are easily pressed from the pulp. Cool, then press seeds from pulp with spoon or in a colander. Drain and save excess juice. Place pulp and skin in a blender and blend. The result is grape puree.
Grape Juice
Wash grapes thoroughly in cold water. Grapes do not need to be seeded. Crush enough grapes to provide juice in botom of dutch oven. Add remaining grapes and heat until grapes are soft. Use bottle or potato masher for crushing. Press out juice by placing grapes in a strong sack cloth with medium size mesh. Twist the two ends of the sack in opposite directions. Refridgerate the juice overnight to precipitate tartaric acid crystals and dregs. Pour clear juice off leaving crystals and dregs in the bottom of the container. Add 1/4 cup of sugar per quart of juice and mix well.
Muscadine Syrup
1 1/2 cups Puree & Juice
1 3/4 cups sugar
1/3 cup light corn syrup
1 teaspoon Florida lemon juice
Mix all ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a full rolling boil; boil for 2 minutes. Remove from heat, skim off foam with a metal spoon. Pour quickly into hot sterilized jars, leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Cover with lids. Process in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes. Yields about 1 1/2 pints.
Muscadine Jelly
4 cups grape juice stock
7cups sugar
1/2 bottle liquid pectin
Fully ripened fruit may be used for jelly made with commercial pectin. Measure juice into kettle. Stir in sugear. Place on high heat and stirring constantly, bring quickly to full rolling boil that can not be stirred down.
Add pectin and heat again to a full rolling boil. Boil hard for one minute. Remove from heat; skim off foam quickly. Pour at once into hot sterile glasses and seal.
Note: Add 1/3 more sugar when using wild grapes.
Muscadine Pie
4 cups Florida Muscadine Grapes
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon Florida lemon juice
1 tablespoon orange rind (optional)
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)
pastry for 9″ lattice-top pie
2 tablespoons butter or margerine , melted
Deseed grapes, reserving juice. Mix all ingredients except pie crust and butter in bowl or blender container. Let grape mixture sit for 15 minutes; pour into uncooked pie shell and top with lattice. Brush top with butter. Place pie in preheated 450 degree oven, bake for 10 minutes, then reduce heat to 350 degrees and bake for additional 20 minutes.
Cool and serve plain or with whipped topping or vanilla ice cream.
Muscadine Cheese Pie
8oz. package of cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup sugar
2 Florida eggs
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 pint dairy sour cream
1 1/2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Beat Cream cheese until fluffy; add sugar, eggs and almond extract. Beat until thick and thoroughly mixed. Fill a 9″ pie plate and bake for about 25 minutes in a preheated 350 degree oven. Cool, mix together sour cream, sugar and vanilla. Spread on top of baked layer, return to oven and bake for 10 minutes. Cool and top with fruit glaze, refrigerate several hours before serving.
Muscadine Glaze
4 1/2 cups of Florida Muscadine grapes, deseeded
Sugar to taste
1 tablespoon tapioca
Puree grapes in blender or press through a sieve sweeten pureed grapes to taste. Add tapioca, let stand 10 minutes. Cook mixture until thick. Cool and spread on top of pie.
Muscadine Wine Barbeque Sauce
1/2 cup salad oil
1/2 cup vinegar
1 1/2 cups of Red Muscadine Wine
1 tablespoon Florida lemon juice
1 meduim Florida oniondiced
1 small Florida garlic clove Minced
1 tateaspoon Worchestershire Sauce
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
Bring to boil Cook for two minutes. Can be used as a marinade.
Wine Ice or Sorbet
Ices or sorbets are delicate and light in flavor and are a perfect finale to a rich holiday meal. Conveniently, sorbets can be made a day ahead and kept in the freezer until serving time.
1 750ml bottle of Florida Wine
1 1/2 cups of sugar syrup (1 1/4 each sugar and water brought to a boil, slightly reduced to 1 1/2 cups, and cool.)
juice of one Florida lemon
Combine the ingredients and freeze in an ice cream maker according to the manufacture’s directions. If an ice cream maker is unavailable, pour the the mixture into shallow metal trays and put into freezer. After about 30 minutes, stir with a fork to break up the frozen edges. Repeat freezing and stirring twice more. Once frozen, the mixture may be smoothed in a food processor and placed in a covered container and kept until ready to serve. The ice does not freeze hard and is easy to spoon into bowls just before serving.
