Watermelon Jelly and Watermelon Fruit Leather

With more watermelons in the garden, I decided to experiment with new recipes. We grew heirloom watermelons, so they are full of seeds.

What I did: I scooped the pulp from the watermelon with an ice cream scooper, removed seeds (and saved some), and pressed the pulp through this colander. The juice was used for the jelly, and the remaining pulp saved for the fruit leather. You can freeze your juice also.

With the recipe from 365 days of Creative Canning's blogspot (blogspot is no longer there), I made both the jelly and the fruit leather. However, the jelly recipe states it yields 5 half pint jars, I ended up with about 10. It did not set either. However, from what the blogpost stated, this may set up a week to two weeks later.

I am sure it's because I used a 6 qt pot and it started to overflow, so I kept removing it to keep it from boiling over. I will do this again, but with a larger pot.

I used the leftover pulp for a tray of fruit leather. This is our first time making watermelon fruit leather. From what I have read, it's pretty bland if it's dehydrated by itself. With this recipe, it was very good. I can freeze it for 12 months too. It is much cheaper than fruit roll-ups, and a lot healthier. And I know the fruit is organic, since I grew it myself. This dried in 5 hours in my dehydrator at 135°.

The recipe stated to stir and pour, but I put this in my food processor to mix thoroughly. Otherwise, it was a bit lumpy.

This filled one tray on my Excalibur dehydrator.

To store these, I simply cut the parchment paper in strips (with kitchen sheers), peeled the fruit leather off and rolled between two pieces of waxed paper. I placed them in sandwich bags for the kids lunches.

This was another way for me to stock up and not waste anything from the garden. And once again, I shocked my hubby. He's already telling me he'd like to buy me a larger dehydrator. Ha ha ha!

Watermelon Jelly and Watermelon Fruit Leather © Sept 2012 by Kristina at Pioneer Woman at Heart