Mustard and chutney: two jar gifts to make now for the julbord
Both taste harsh the day you make them and lovely six weeks later. Start a grainy mustard and an apple and pear chutney this week, ready for Christmas.
Tonight Skåne sits down to black soup and roast goose for Mårten Gås, and that tells me the julbord is six weeks away. Six weeks is exactly what two of my favourite jar gifts need: a grainy mustard and a dark apple and pear chutney. Both taste rough on the day you make them. Both are lovely by Christmas Eve.
I make mine with the last apples and pears from the cellar racks, the ones with a bruise or a soft shoulder that will not keep until January. Nothing wasted, and a row of jars on the pantry shelf by the weekend.
Make them this week and they will have time to mellow. Leave them until mid-December and you will be giving away something harsh and vinegary.
Mustard: four ingredients and some patience
Mustard heat appears the moment crushed seed meets liquid. Cold water gives the fiercest result. Warm liquid, or vinegar added from the start, gives a gentler one. For a gift that suits ham, herring and cheese, I go gentle and slightly sweet, in the spirit of Swedish julsenap.
- Seeds: 100 g yellow mustard seeds and 50 g brown mustard seeds.
- Soak: cover with 150 ml cider vinegar and 100 ml water in a bowl, then leave overnight at room temperature. The seeds will drink most of it.
- Season: add 2 tablespoons honey or 3 tablespoons light muscovado sugar and 1 teaspoon salt.
- Blend: pulse with a stick blender until about half the seeds are broken. Stop sooner for a coarser mustard. Loosen with a splash of water or vinegar if it is stiff.
- Rest: spoon into clean jars and keep in the fridge.
For the first few days it will taste bitter and sharp. Give it at least a week, better two, in the fridge and the bitterness fades into warmth. The seeds keep absorbing liquid, so check it after a few days and stir in a little more vinegar if it has set too firm. Homemade mustard keeps for several months in the fridge.
Chutney: the cheese board's best friend
Chutney is fruit, onion, sugar and vinegar cooked slowly until jammy. The vinegar and sugar are what preserve it, so do not cut them down. Use a vinegar of at least 5% acidity.
- Fruit: 1 kg apples and pears, peeled, cored and diced, weighed after trimming.
- Onion: 300 g, finely chopped.
- Dried fruit: 150 g raisins or chopped dried figs.
- Sweet and sour: 300 g light brown sugar and 300 ml cider vinegar.
- Spice: a thumb of fresh ginger, grated, 1 teaspoon mustard seeds, 1 teaspoon salt, a pinch of chilli flakes and a few cloves tied in muslin.
- Cook: simmer everything, uncovered and stirring more often towards the end, for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. It is ready when a wooden spoon drawn across the base of the pan leaves a channel that does not fill with liquid straight away.
Pot it hot into hot sterilised jars, right to the top, and seal at once. Store unopened jars somewhere cool and dark. Chutney needs at least four weeks for the vinegar to soften, and unopened it will keep for up to a year. Once opened, keep it in the fridge and use it within about a month.
Bella's tip: Vinegar eats bare metal, so use jars with coated, vinegar-proof lids, or the clip-top kind with a rubber seal. To sterilise, wash the jars in hot soapy water, rinse, then dry them on a tray in a 140°C oven for 15 minutes. Boil the lids or rubber seals rather than baking them.
From now to Christmas Eve
- This week: Make the chutney and soak the mustard seeds. The chutney needs every one of those six weeks.
- Late November: Taste the mustard and loosen it if needed. Write labels with the date made.
- Mid-December: Decant mustard into small gift jars and wrap the chutney.
- 24 December: Open a jar of each for your own julbord. You have earned it.
How to wrap and give them
Small jars, 150 to 200 ml, are better than one big one. Most people will finish a small jar before it goes stale in the fridge. A square of linen or brown paper over the lid and a piece of string is all the decoration they need.
Always write on the label what it is, the date it was made and how to keep it. The mustard must live in the fridge. The chutney goes in the fridge once opened. If you want to make a fuller present, pair the chutney with a wedge of aged cheese and the mustard with a good sausage or a slice of the Christmas ham, which Swedes brush with mustard before it goes under its breadcrumb crust anyway.
In my house the first jar of mustard rarely makes it to Christmas. It disappears on a Sunday bollito and a plate of winter cheese long before.
Recipe: beetroot cured salmon with mustard dill sauce
Recipe: brantevik pickled herring
