How to make Lilly Pilly Jam - a delicious Australian bush tucker delight

When we moved to our current home about 20 years or so ago we found a Lilly Pilly bush in our front yard.  This is a plant native to the eastern states of Australia, but which grows well in the west too. It has very fleshy leaves and a very attractive small flower, which you can see below, but which withers almost immediately if picked.  The bees love them.

Following flowering a small red fruit forms, about the length of your thumbnail. We have tasted them from time to time over the years. They have a crisp flesh, not unpleasant taste, though slightly acid, and probably an acquired taste.  They have a small stone in the middle. You can see my bush and the fruit below here. 

The origin of the name Lilly Pilly is unknown. The first recorded sighting of a lilly pilly in Australia was Syzygium paniculatum. On May 3 1770 at Botany Bay botanist Joseph Banks stated in his journal: They "found also several trees which bore fruit of the Jambosa kind, much in colour and shape resembling cherries; of these they eat plentifully and brought home also abundance, which we eat with much pleasure tho they had little to recommend them but light acid."
From:  Australian Plants OnLine 

There are several varieties of Lilly Pilly, belonging to the  Myrtaceae family. 
The Lilly Pilly was a bush tucker for the Aboriginal inhabitants, and was prized by early European settlers for making jams and jellies.  It seems to have been used soon after the establishment of Sydney town in New South Wales. 

Jam making is a tradition in my family and I have been intending to make Lilly Pilly Jam ever since I discovered the plant in our front garden, and yesterday I did. My husband wanted to prune the bush as it had got quite big and was starting to develop a scale infestation as it had the previous year. So I picked about a kilo and a half of fruit and made the jam on Saturday morning. 

 The recipe I used came originally from the National Trust of Australia, New South Wales, and is in my Australia's Home Made Jams and Preserves Book compiled by sugar company CSR. I have used many recipes in this little book. 

The recipe was actually for jelly, but I adapted it to make jam. 

Lilly Pilly Jam 

Remove stalks and stones from the fruit and wash well. Place in the pan with a little water. I used 2 cups of water to 1.245kgs of fruit. Cook until fruit is tender (about an hour). I also added one lemon cut in half to the pan as the lemon will help with setting. 
When the fruit is tender add the same weight of sugar as the weight of fruit. 
Boil till jam sets when tested. This took about another hour, but will really depend on the quantity you are cooking. 
Remove the lemon halves, bottle the jam in sterile jars and seal immediately. 

The jam is a beautiful deep pink-red colour and I think tastes a little like a mix between plum and strawberry jam. Delicious! I made scones this morning so my family could taste the jam. They all enjoyed it, so I think I will from now on be making Lilly Pilly jam every year. 

Another reference to the Lilly Pilly can be found in May Gibb's children's book, The Complete Adventures of Snugglepot and Cuddlepie, an Australian classic about the gum nut babies first published in 1918. I told you about the bad Banksia Men from the book a couple of weeks ago. Please click here if you missed it -  Celebration of the Australian Banksia

Here is an illustration from the book of the characters Lilly Pilly and Ragged Blossom. In the book Lilly Pilly is an actress.  You can see here below on the left with the lilly pilly fruit forming the skirt of her dress. 
For more about May Gibbs click here - May Gibbs

I hope you have enjoyed my blog post about the Lilly Pilly. If you are in Australia and you have it growing in your garden, I hope you will make some Lilly Pilly Jam. 
Is there a native fruit that you make into jam? Perhaps you would like to share with us in the comments.

Here are a couple of references on the web:
Burke's Back Yard
Australian Native Plants Society
Evergreen Growers - scale pest on Lilly Pilly
Taste Australia - Bush Food


Thank you so much for stopping by. I value your comments and look forward to hearing from you. I will try to visit your blogs in return. Have a wonderful week.

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Quandongs, delicious Australian bush food
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Quandongs - delicious Australian bush food

Have you ever tasted Quandongs - or Quandong jam? Do you know what Quandongs are? Have you ever seen them in the bush?

Today I have taken a little side step from my blogging about our recent trip through South Australia - but really this post is a little more detail about a bush food you can see and taste in South Australia - the Quandong 


My curiosity with the Quandong started many years ago..... but even before this newspaper article in the West Australian newspaper in 1995 I knew about Quandongs. My mother said when she was a child they used to use quandong nuts on their Chinese Checkers game. 

 I wrote this creative piece for my writing group exercise -


The shiny red baubles hang in clusters glistening in the shafts of early morning light. It is a surprise to see them amongst the dull grey green. Their beauty entices me to crouch underneath their bright canopy. I reach up and gently tug at the nearest bauble. It resists and then yields. The ball is round and hard. I can see where it has been marked by creatures unseen. 

I squat on the carpet of green, red, yellow and brown balls that have fallen from the tree. Some are split and broken revealing a glimpse of the treasure within. I pick up one and pull aside the thin shell to reveal a perfectly round hard ball patterned with wavy lines. 

Curious I bite into the red ball that I have plucked from above. The tart bitter sweetness is a shock, but is irresistible. I nibble away the thin red and yellow layer and then secret the round knobbly nut in my pocket.  

As I reach up to pluck another bauble I sense someone is watching me. Looking across the clearing I see the soft brown eyes of a kangaroo gazing at me. In its hands is a bright red shiny bauble. 

- Jill Harrison, May 2013- 

  
I had seen plants during our travels through the Western Australia wheatbelt - but it was only a couple of years ago that I saw them fruiting and had the opportunity to taste them. They have a sharp bitter taste when eaten raw. 

Santalum Acuminatum or the Quandong 

CommonName:	Quandong; Sweet Quandong, Wild Peach, Desert Peach, Native Peach, Guwandhuna, Gutchu, Wanjanu, Mangata, Goorti, Wadjal (Aboriginal names)
BotanicalName:	Santalum acuminatum

The Quandong is a truly unique native Australian fruit. Traditionally the Quandong was an important food and medicinal source for Australian Aborigines and was also used by early pioneers and settlers as a fruit, or in jams and chutneys. Found in the arid and semi-arid regions of all Australian mainland states, Quandong trees are ideally adapted to arid environments. The Santalum Acuminatum species is known to be a semi-parasitic plant. Quandong trees can tolerate high soil salinity levels and often rely for their complete water requirements from the root systems of host plants. Across their native distribution range, Quandong trees typically grow 2 to 3 metres in height, with a dense leathery crown of leaves perhaps 2 metres wide. 

 You can read more about Quandongs at "Nullarbor Net" by clicking here - Quandongs - Nullarbornet

We have seen Quandong trees many times during our travels through the West Australian wheatbelt and along the Hyden to Norseman Road in Western Australia. More recently we saw them during our travels through South Australia.  They have a dull green dry looking leaf, but in season the bright red fruits attract your attention.
We saw this beautiful specimen you see here in the Coffin Bay area of the Eyre Peninsular in South Australia.

Quandongs are very similar to - Australian Sandalwood (Santalum spicatum) - and in fact belong to the same family.  Below you can see the Sandalwood on the left and the Quandong on the right.  The nut of the Sandalwood is smooth (sorry you can't see it in this picture) whilst the nut of the Quandong is nobbly. 

Harvesting wild Quandong fruit is prohibited, but when we visited the Australian Arid Lands Botanic Garden  in Port Augusta in South Australia in October, I purchased some Quandong fruit leather, preserves and dried Quandong, from plantation grown fruit by Bush Food Australia - click here - Bush Food Australia . We also tried the Quandong icecream and the Quandong cake in the Arid Lands cafe. The fruit has a tart-bitter sweet taste - delicious!

After our return home I made some Quandong jam - seen here below served with wattleseed pancakes and cream with wattleseed sprinkled over (watteseed is another bush food I bought from the Australian Arid Lands Botanic Garden)
Oh my goodness I am in raptures over quandong jam! 
I cooked down the fruit with a couple of green apples and the juice of 2 lemons. 
 

 You can buy dried Quandong from "Native Tastes of Australia" - click here to see more - Native Tastes of Australia
 On their site you will see some Quandong recipes including jam.  

 Here is an interesting post about edible native foods - click here - why-havent-we-embraced-indigenous-foods

 Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed learning something about the Quandong. Next week we will return to our South Australian travels.
If you missed any of my previous posts about our South Australia trip you can catch up by clicking on the links below -

On the road through South Australia 

Granite & Woodlands Discovery Trail - Hyden to Norseman 

 The Eyre Highway - crossing Australia

 Rock formations and wildflowers in the Gawler Ranges National Park & Port Augusta, South Australia

 I am linking up to linkup sharing blogs below. Please click on the links to see fabulous contributions from around the world - virtual touring at its best!  Have a wonderful week.

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Travel Photo Thursday
 Oh The Places I've Been