Syrian Jams and Preserves

The usual list of jam fruits works differently in Aleppo. The city’s own entries are pumpkin, aubergine, walnut and bitter orange. Not one of them is a fruit. The jar arrives at the breakfast table beside the clotted cream and the cheese, not at the end of a meal as a dessert.

How aubergine jam is made

The aubergines are picked while very small, before they ripen. The skin is peeled off in strips, they are boiled for 10 to 15 minutes, then simmered in sugar syrup. Rose water and clove go in at that stage. Each cooked aubergine is then stuffed with almond or walnut, so every piece that comes out of the jar is whole and filled.

The habit of keeping vegetables in sugar goes back to the Ottoman palace kitchen. Aleppo kept at it. The city still has a larder shelf with a range you will not find assembled anywhere else.

Quince, the larder classic

In Syria quince jam is called the mountain sweet of winter, and it is put up at the end of autumn. There are two methods: grated, which is what you spread on bread, and sliced, which holds its shape on a plate. The Syrian zebadi quince is preferred because it is high in pectin, so the jam sets without anything added to thicken it.

Rose jam has its own entry

Jam, water and syrup made from the Damask rose are covered in their own entry on this site and are not repeated here. Rose jam sits on the Aleppo shelf too, but what sets the city apart is the vegetable jar.