Art of Making Quince Cheese/Membrillo: A Step-by-Step Guide

Raw quince on a cutting board.

Scraping the seeds out of the quince.

Boiling the quince.

Fully pureed quince.

Fully baked quince cheese.

Wrapping the quince cheese for storage.

Several years ago, my grandmother went to the cemetery to visit my grandfather's plot around christmas time. She noticed these large yellow fruits on the edge of the field in one of the plantings and picked one up from the ground to bring home. She showed it to me and asked me if I knew what it was and what to do with it.

I told her that it was a quince; but that I had never seen one in person before, and so had no idea what to do with it. She asked me if I wanted it and I told her that I would absolutely love to take it home and play around with this new ingredient.

I looked through several of my books and also looked at google to see what I could find on these mysterious fruits.

So the first thing I learned is that quince are related to apples and pears but unlike them, the quince is typically eaten cooked and sweetened as it has a very hard, dry, astringent taste when its raw. It also has a lot of pectin in it and so can be used to help thicken jams and jellies and pies made with other kinds of fruits low in pectin, like berries.

Quince is a popular fruit in the Mediterranean and was very common in colonial New England as the bushes grow well here and the fruits will last a very long time if kept cold. This would've been pretty easy even during colonial times as the fruits ripen at the end of November or beginning of December and could've just been left in a shed or root cellar.

Quince cheese or in Spanish, Membrillo, is the recipe I'll be teaching y'all about today. This was a food eaten commonly during the colonial times of New England as it keeps for a very long time and would provide a source of Vitamin C during the winter. I have had a piece of quince cheese in my refrigerator since last year and it's still delicious and mold free.

To watch me make this recipe click here!

Ingredients:

-At least one whole ripe quince.

-1 cardamom pod per quince and 1 more for luck.

-Part of a Vanilla bean, I used a quarter of a bean for 2 quince.

-Pinch of Sumac, I use Staghorn but any will do.

-Sugar to taste.

-Water.

-Coconut Oil.

Method:

1. Cut the quince in halves and use a spoon to scrape out the core and seeds.

2. Cut the quince into quarters and slice them thin.

3. Add to a pot with enough water to cover the quince and then add in the cardamom pods and vanilla bean.

4. Boil the quince until it has become soft and has changed color on the inside from pale yellowish white to dark maroonish magenta.

5. Drain the quince and reserve the liquid. It can be used to make jelly candy or to make a jelly layer in a cake. (see Recipe for Wild berry Cloud Cake)

6. Puree the quince in a food processor and add sugar to taste.

7. Once the puree is smooth, transfer it to a greased ceramic or glass baking dish and bake it for as long as it takes for it to separate from the sides of the dish. (baking paper is not necessary ,you should be able to invert the dish and the quince cheese should slide out if its dried out enough.)

8. The quince cheese needs to be baked at about 200F for several hours or longer. You are trying to dry it out. The top will feel hard when its ready and it will appear black and slightly burnt.

9. The quince cheese will need to completely cool in the pan.

10. Once it is cooled, invert the pan, remove quince cheese, and wrap in plastic. It will keep in the fridge for over a year.