1. Mix them with sweet apples for pie (what my neighbor does) 2. Make "membrillo" 3. Paradise jelly (I've made almost 20 jars this year). 4. Preserves Linda Zeidrich's Joy of Jams has a few quince recipes, try doing a search on Harvest forum too. Here's my recipe (small batch, the original was a huge batch) for Paradise Jelly (apple-quince-cranberry): Paradise Jelly (makes 3 halfpints) I steamed the quinces a couple of days ahead and put the juice in the fridge. Didn't weigh them, but probably 5 lbs of quinces yielded about 7.5 cups of juice - or at least brown water (I'm not sure how much pectin was in the juice - I kept adding water to the pot while steaming.). I think the juice would have been lighter if I had simmered the quinces, or if I had a steam juicer, instead of trying to steam them in the oven - they oxidized. Then I did the apples and cranberries another day (just 5lbs of mixed apples, not all tart, most Golden and Red (?) Delicious since that's what I had. Got about 6 cups of juice from those.) Used a 12-oz bag of cranberries cooked until just popped in the hot strained apple juice, let drain in linen jelly bag for 5 hours, refrigerated juice and put the fruit pulp into a Ziploc bag with the apple pulp. I milled the fruit the next day, cooked with 1/2C of sugar, and made about 36 oz (pint, 12-oz jar processed 20 min and 8-oz jar in fridge) of cran-applesauce. I strained the apple-cranberry juice through coffee filters the next day. Now, for the jelly: Mix the quince juice and the cran-apple juice half and half (or whatever you have). Use no more than 4C of juice total, or this will set before you get it in the jars. Use at least a 6-quart (deep) preserving pan b/c it will foam up like crazy. Add 3C of sugar to the 4C of juice, I also added 1 tsp of bottled (strained) lemon juice. Simmer, stirring constantly, until the sugar is dissolved, then raise heat to a boil (make sure your canner is preheated with the jars sterilized if processing only 5 minutes). Boil until gel point (220 at sea level) or until jelly sheets from a metal spoon (remove from heat while testing). Quickly skim if necessary. Jar immediately, keeping ladle close to funnel. Do all 3 jars at once, then go back and spoon off any foam from the top of the jars, adjust the headspace to 1/4", wipe rims and put lids and rings on. DON'T use a bubble freer even if you see tiny bubbles in the jars - just wait til they rise to the surface and spoon the foam off. Process 5 minutes (for sterilized jars) or 10 min (for unsterilized) in BWB. The last jar you fill may have some small bubbles, and you might have an ounce or 2 left in the pan to put in the fridge. Rinse out the pan with very hot water and dry before starting the next batch - you don't want "threads" of old jelly in the new batch. This may set up very quickly (while you're ladling it into the jars) or it may take a couple of weeks depending on the pectin level of the juice. Set the cooled jars away on a level surface and leave them alone for 2-3 weeks before you decide you've made syrup instead of jelly. I tried reprocessing some and found that the top of the jar was liquid after a week, but the bottom was starting to set so I should have left it alone. The apple-quince jelly I made is taking longer to set than the stuff with cranberry in it.

(from America's Test Kitchen) Ingredients unbleached all-purpose flour, for work surface 1 box frozen puff pastry, (Pepperidge Farm, 1.1 pound), thawed in box in refigerator overnight 1 large egg, beaten 2 ounces grated Parmesan cheese, (about 1 cup) 1 pound plum tomatoes, (about 3 to 4 medium), cored and cut crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices table salt 2 medium cloves garlic, minced or pressed through garlic press (about 2 teaspoons) 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil Ground black pepper 8 ounces whole-milk mozzarella cheese, shredded (2 cups) 2 ounces prosciutto, thinly sliced 2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 425 degrees. Dust work surface with flour and unfold both pieces puff pastry onto work surface. Following illustrations below, form 1 large sheet with border, using beaten egg as directed. Sprinkle Parmesan evenly over shell; using fork, uniformly and thoroughly poke holes in shell. Bake 13 to 15 minutes, then reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees; continue to bake until golden brown and crisp, 13 to 15 minutes longer. Transfer to wire rack; increase oven temperature to 425 degrees. While shell bakes, place tomato slices in single layer on double layer paper towels and sprinkle evenly with 1/2 teaspoon salt; let stand 30 minutes. Place second double layer paper towels on top of tomatoes and press firmly to dry tomatoes. Combine garlic, olive oil, and pinch each salt and pepper in small bowl; set aside. Sprinkle mozzarella evenly over warm (or cool, if made ahead) baked shell. Arrange prosciutto in single layer on top of mozzarella. Shingle tomato slices widthwise on top of prosciutto (about 4 slices per row); brush tomatoes with garlic oil. Bake until shell is deep golden brown and cheese is melted, 15 to 17 minutes. Cool on wire rack 5 minutes, sprinkle with basil, slide onto cutting board or serving platter, cut into pieces, and serve.

I adapted a recipe for basically a quince galette I found on the NYTimes cooking site last year and it was fabulous. You sauteed the quince in a bit of butter and then sprinkled it with some sugar (I used turbinado and no more than a tbsp or two) and then spread it on a pie crust and sprinkled it with toasted coarsely chopped nuts (I think I used pecans or walnuts) and some crumbled blue cheese. Baked it on tiles in a very hot oven until the crust was done and the cheese bubbly. Really, really good as a hot/room temp appetizer for holiday parties. If you search quince on the NYT cooking site, you should pull it up.

And hence the joy of making your own preserves!! Once you start, you do become addicted to the superior taste and quality. You'd pay a pretty penny for a store-bought item with that level of taste and quality ingredients and craftmanship. Right now I am deep into pickle variations. I make and like bread and butters but have yet to find a dill that I can bwb that I like. I need to make shelf-stable ones to give away and store. But I have made tolerable dill sandwich slices. But I am going to give kosher dills another try, even thought the refrigerator ones are the real special deals. I have so many cukes and tomatoes I might not get to many jams this year. I hope I can get some blueberry lime jam made. Blueberry is one of the jams that I think is far superior to store bought in every way. That's not a particularly great cheese board item though . . . I found my recipe for "brandied carrot jam" which has the plus of being able to be made at my leisure any time of year . . . Although peach preserves are one of my favorite, I made a bunch last year and still have them so they might get pushed to the back burner for another year due to my glut of waiting tomatoes . . . Today I noticed I have a package of Certo, maybe I'll try an herbal jelly this year or a pepper jelly . . . If it manages to jell it will be fab. If not, I will get sick of using it as a sauce . . . I think the theme for my canning this year is going to be savories mostly. 60+ tomato plants and a couple of monster cucumber plants are seeing to that . . . I made the mistake of going on the "Nuts.com" last night. If all else fails, I may order some products from there to fill out my gift baskets. I have always wanted to try some of their products. I can't afford much in the way of fancy snacks but a few splurges will be hard to resist. The dark chocolate covered cranberries are calling my name . . .