Royal Medlar Tree [Mespilus germanica 'Royal']

Many jelly enthusiasts claim that the mayhaw fruit is cooked into the world's most delicious jelly, while others, expecially Europeans, claim that quince jelly is the prize winner. Very few jelly lovers have eaten medlar jelly in the United States, since that fruit is so rare that it is virtually unknown by American fruit growers.

For those people lucky enough to have eaten medlar jelly from England, where it is available but extremely expensive, it has been touted as more exotic and powerfully aromatic than any other confection in the world.

To make medlar jelly, the aged, wrinkled fruit is chopped into pieces into water and simmered for three hours. To the liquid mixture is added an equal weight of chopped overripe medlars and sugar and filtered until it gels in containers to be eaten. The garnet gemstone color of the medlar jelly develops with suggestive varying tones of yellow, orange, red and even green. The variation in the rainbow colors of medlar jelly is also repeated in the combination of complex flavor combinations of loquat, citrus, fig and dates.