Occasional cooks: failed experiments

Here is your weekly thread to talk anything and everything food. 

Share what you're cooking this week, ask for tips or recipes for a dish, tell us about your meals out. 

Via Daring Gourmet

Last week, I was enjoying some quince paste with my night cheese, but also wondering about the amount of sugar in each serve, since I am trying to eliminate as much sugar as possible. So the obvious answer was, can I make my own quince paste with a sugar substitute?

It was still a germ of an idea, but then when I was in the supermarket, I decided to go for it. I googled quince paste recipes (even though I knew they did not have quinces available), and found this recipe for membrillo - the Spanish quince paste that is served with Manchego. Bought pears instead of quinces, a bag of stevia (never used before, what can go wrong), and I was away. (If I'd done my research at home, I might have been more aware of the pitfalls, but in the supermarket on my phone, I skimmed and went for it).

Once the pear was all cooking away on the stove, I thought I should google a bit and see if stevia could be used in preserves... hmm, there might be a problem. Although some recipes said a mix of stevia and sugar might work.

Another problem - quinces are apparently really high in pectin, essential to setting preserves, pears, I don't know...

Next problem - the recipes say to measure the cooked fruit and then add the same amount of sugar. I was supposed to measure by cups, couldn't be bothered, did it by weight. But the bag of stevia was only half the weight of the cooked pear - well, pears are sweeter than quinces, right? She'll be right.

Now, I have to cook for an hour or two, until it becomes a thick paste - that's not happening - what if I dump in a little sugar now? No dice.

Last step was baking in a shallow dish in a very low oven - at this point it was supposed to be a very thick paste, but mine is very much not. 

This step is really just drying the paste out to a firm, cut-able slice. I figure, if I'm lucky, I can get mine to a spreadable paste, instead of a liquid. A couple of hours later, I gave it up as a bunch of useful lessons in the importance of food science, and tipped the lot into the bin.

Still planning on trying again, with a little more forethought and research. Edible Christmas gifts for my cheese-loving family is the end goal.

What's gone wrong in your kitchen?