Marmalade adds citrus boost to herb dressing for chicken

If you’ve dabbled in making jams or other preserved foods, then you may be familiar with Marisa McClellan and her popular website, Food in Jars. She’s a food writer and cooking teacher and the author of three books on canning, including the 2012 best-seller Food in Jars.

Her new cookbook, The Food in Jars Kitchen, was inspired by a frequent question from her readers — about what to do with all those preserves. From pulled chicken with apple butter and cider vinegar to a sauerkraut frittata, McClellan offers appealing ideas for using what you’ve stashed in your pantry.

McClellan describes this marinade as being “built on the bones” of a recipe she learned from family friends Maria and Raphael Baker. She says they made a similar marinade by the gallon and used it as a salad dressing, vegetable marinade and sandwich spread at a small chain of restaurants they ran in California and Oregon in the 1980s and ’90s.

“I use it mostly as a marinade for chicken thighs and zucchini that are destined for the grill, but it is also a favorite for dressing chopped salads,” she says in the recipe’s introduction.

Herbed Marmalade Marinade

2/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

3 tablespoons red wine vinegar

3 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

2 tablespoons lemon or orange marmalade

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 tablespoon dried basil

1 tablespoon dried oregano

1 tablespoon dried thyme

2 teaspoons dry mustard

1 teaspoon fine sea salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

In a blender, combine the olive oil, vinegar, lemon juice, marmalade, garlic cloves, basil, oregano, thyme, mustard, salt and pepper. Blend until just incorporated and pour into a mason jar for storage. It will keep in the refrigerator for up to 1 month.

Makes about 1¼ cups. Recipe from The Food in Jars

Kitchen by Marisa McClellan; published by Running Press.