Perhaps jelly is the remedy?
I am craving some joy. I suspect we all are. Just a little. Not an ‘ignoring the ills of the world and laughing in the face of other’s lot’, type joy, but just a momentary ‘pause and have a little giggle to oneself’, type joy. I think we can all allow ourselves that occasionally.
I’ve been considering 90’s birthday cakes, specifically those from a wonderful little book called ‘The Australian Women’s Weekly Cake Book’ which (troublingly gendered title aside) was responsible for some of the most joy-inducing food moments of my life, let alone my childhood.
The first birthday cake I remember (I’m guessing it might have been my fifth birthday,) was a swimming pool cake. It was constructed from a simple chocolate sponge which was iced with chocolate buttercream, edged in chocolate fingers, hollowed out and then filled with icy blue jelly. The photo below would suggest filling the pool with relaxing figures, but I recall my cake having a diving board, swimmers, and maybe a race in progress.
My birthday is in the middle of the summer holidays, but by the time I returned to school in September people were still talking about this cake. It even got the seal of approval from Tom Maberley, a boy three years above me and the best swimmer in the school. It’s fair to say I requested the same cake the following year. As with all these things, you can’t bottle magic, the zeitgeist had moved on.
I’ve been worrying this week about money. I’ve got a gas bill I can’t afford; my reliable triumvirate of the greengrocer, Aldi and Oddbox are all teasing up their prices as their margins get squeezed; I can barely afford to heat my home or fill my car, and yet, I’m aware that I am at the privileged tip of the precarious game of Kerplunk that we call society in Britain, so I am petrified about how bad this could get. It’s only going to take about one more round of the bellends in parliament pulling out the little sticks that hold everything in place and all the marbles are going to go everywhere. I mean, who am I kidding, we’re there already, aren’t we? The marbles have gone, and the game is over.
And yet, as I navigate the weekly schedule of cooking and eating on an ever-tightening budget, my tastes and cravings have leant towards things cheering, celebratory, joy-inducing and fun. Deeply worrying as the world is, stretched as I am, I find that more and more I’ve been thinking about jelly.
It’s fallen out of favour, jelly. And it’s no surprise. It serves no purpose in terms of nutrition, it’s an addendum, a novelty. And it takes no skill, right?
Jelly was once the happy preserve of the children's party, but I’ve attended enough friend’s and family’s kid's parties to have observed for certain that it’s off the menu, as is much of the carefree fun-food of my childhood. Take children’s birthday cakes, they are now multi-layered and tasteful, informed by Violet Bakery or Lilly Vanilli more than they are the cake book of my youth. You’re more likely to hear little Miles and Ginny arguing over falafel or the last morsel of babaganoush than you are party rings, hula hoops or mini pizzas. And I can tell you without hesitation that the little nippers of today are not being afforded the sheer joy of a bowl of bright red jelly and fast-melting vanilla ice cream.
Maybe we need to give jelly another chance. If we stop and think about it, jelly could be the perfect balm for our times. We can, and definitely should, rail against the ills of the world; we can, and definitely should consider the planet and our impact on it when it comes to travel and our consumption; we can, and definitely should, eat better, shop better, cook better; but also we can, and definitely should, allow ourselves the occasional and momentary luxury of not worrying about it all, of not being virtuous in everything we do. Everyone can enjoy jelly.
The thing about jelly is that its superpower is also its kryptonite. It is not a technique that was invented to preserve food, it is not fermenting or picking or brining or smoking, all techniques that have enjoyed their heyday in the Instagram age. It is not a way to eat better or more healthily, so the wellness crew haven’t taken ownership. It offers nothing in the way of hacks so no one has made it TikTok famous.
And yet, having spent a few days trying to make and photograph various jellies, I’m here to tell you that jelly is more complex than one might imagine. Jelly does take some care and consideration to get right, jelly does require some focus. Creating a beautiful and delicious jelly is no mean feat. Getting it right should be a badge of honour. I mean consider my pitiful attempts below:
The truth is that jelly was always a flex. It was always a display of wealth. The laborious process of extracting natural gelatin from calves trotters meant it was linked to status and largesse, the preserve of Kings and Queens and people who lived in large country houses. People who had little to worry about and so instead spent their time creating joyful displays out of jelly. Hence Grandma’s collection of jelly moulds, a hangover from a time when producing a jelly meant something, said something about you. So then what happened? Who ruined jelly? Who designated jelly as a novelty?
Perhaps jelly ruined itself? It was too easy, too accessible. In a world that chases novelty and complexity, jelly is just too simple. Jelly doesn’t say enough about itself. doesn't say enough about us, about the people making it, or serving it, or ordering in in a restaurant. What am I saying? Jelly is not available in restaurants.
Like many things, I suppose jelly became commodified, then adopted by the middle classes, the masses, and then became overexposed. When the sum of its parts is a sugary liquid that has been slightly solidified, it is easy to see why it died a death. The American mass-produced Jell-O was recorded as doing a billion dollars of sales at its peak in 1997. Sales have been in steep and constant decline ever since.
I’ve always blamed posh funsters Bompass and Parr for ruining jelly or at least signalling jelly’s ruin, it’s death knell. Jelly isn't an art form, it isn't a medium to display how clever you are. It's a wibbly wobbly treat and nothing else. However, having singularly failed in my attempts to create beautiful jellies, and having started with thoughts of those ’80s and ‘90’s birthday cakes as described above, I have come to realise that there was far more time and care and attention paid to creating those whimsical birthday treats back in the day than I ever gave credit for. Similarly, there is considerable patience and skill and perseverance needed to pull off a Bompass & Parr jelly installation. Both things are a labour of love. And perhaps that is what we’ve lost. Jelly’s downfall mimics our own descent. It is all too easy, it has all been commodified.
So I correct my earlier assertion; jelly does need skill, jelly is not for everyone, and jelly will take work. And in that reassessment, I believe that jelly is not about the end result, is not about the enjoyment or the joy; jelly is about the care needed for the process. The payoff is not the end result, it is the intention and the labour that will bring you pleasure.
I still say you should make some jelly. It might seem to be little more than dissolving gelatin in some hot water and then whisking it into a pint of liquid, any liquid*. But it will take much more out of you than that, whether you like it or not. You can add fruit to it, or not, and you can try using booze, port or wine or champagne or cider, but each layer of complexity you add to your jelly will add a layer of difficulty in pulling off a decent end result. And that doesn’t mean it’s not worth trying. Trying is exactly the thing. You can serve your jelly with cream or custard or ice cream or all three, and then you can assess if, for even a moment, you feel something approaching joy. If not, then at least you’ve done the hard work of toiling over something so frivolous. You will have learnt something just by doing that. And if you do find joy in the end result, that’s nice, isn’t it? Even if it is just for a moment.
Recipes for two jellies I have enjoyed in the past:
Coffee jelly and yoghurt, tres chic:
I first ate this when I was about 17. It might have been on holiday in Kefalonia, it might have been in a Parisian bistro I didn’t understand, but the point is it caught me unawares and it was delicious. It was chic. I heartily recommend trying it,
600ml or 1 pint of black coffee
2 tsp maple syrup
12g/1 sachet powdered gelatin (or 4 leaves)
Greek yoghurt
Make up your coffee then stir in the maple syrup. Give the coffee a taste, it should be just sweet, not too sweet, but you should be able to discern some sweetness. If it’s not sweet enough here the cold jelly can be underwhelming at the end, that being said, don’t overdo it.
Pour 80ml of the coffee into a small bowl and sprinkle over the gelatin, whisking until it dissolves completely (if using leaf gelatin simply soften it in hot water then whisk it into the hot coffee). Add the gelatin back to the coffee and stir well to combine.
Pour the coffee jelly into moulds, individual ramekins, or a bowl to serve, and place in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
To serve, simply top each serving with plenty of good greek yoghurt.
Pomegranate jelly, blackcurrants and whipped cream, as inspired by Roald Dahl’s cookbook:
There is a lovely recipe in Roald Dahl’s cookbook for a table of layered jellies of every hue, with different fruits suspended within them. I have tried variation after variation over the years, and this one here is the one I come back to again and again. I say mix it up though, try every juice you can lay your hands on with every fruit available to you.
500ml pomegranate juice
12g or 1 sachet of powdered gelatin (dissolved in 75ml of boiling water)
150g blackberries
Whipped or squirty cream to serve
As above, stir the dissolved gelatin into the fruit juice.
Add the blackberries into your moulds or bowls and then pour over the jelly.
Place in the fridge for at least 2 hours then serve with lashings of whipped or squirty cream.
*Some science:
Although many gelatin desserts are made from fruit juice or incorporate fruit, some fresh fruits contain proteolytic enzymes; these enzymes cut the gelatin molecule into peptides (protein fragments) too small to form a firm gel. The use of such fresh fruits in a gelatin recipe results in a dessert that never "sets".
Specifically, pineapple contains the protease (protein cutting enzyme) bromelain, kiwifruit contains actinidin, figs contain ficain, and papaya contains papain.
Cooking or canning denatures and deactivates the proteases, so canned pineapple, for example, works fine in a gelatin dessert.