Muscadine Jelly

Muscadine grapes are our heritage grape here in the South.  It grows wild in the piney woods that stretch across the Southern states, and is cultivated on a small scale from the Gulf Coast to Tennessee.  This is the grape that Gramps used to make that sweet muscadine wine!

It has a thick tannic skin, and a several large pips so it is a difficult grape for commercial processing and so we don’t see it in stores that much.  We use dark plum colored Muscadine grapes grown by Captain Cookie in Mississippi although there is a delightful golden variety for sale at local summer farmer’s markets as well– it is a little drier than the dark ones we use for our Muscadine Jelly.

We cook the juice out of the grapes, and press it all from the skins and mash, then make a lightly colored, grape-y grape jelly.  Wonderful on toast, on hot biscuits, or use it to make a glaze!