Pomegranate, apricot and coconut konnyaku jelly

My family celebrates Christmas with a vegan and gluten free meal – it’s getting better every year too, as we discover and perfect great recipes. We also come out of the meal feeling satisfied but not overly stuffed as can often occur with the usual celebration.

This year I took charge of dessert. I made a stupendously good, brandy-soaked traditional pudding and surprised everyone, including myself, with this beautiful layered konnyaku jelly.

When I first discovered konnyaku jelly it was a revelation – it was so firm I could pick it up with my fingers, and when I bit into it, the jelly was light, refreshingly sweet and actually crunchy! I’d never had jelly you could chew before but it was delicious.

Konnyaku comes from pounded roots of a yam-like plant called konjac, and has little flavour of its own so can be used as a base for all sorts of interesting savoury and sweet jellies. I found it at a local Asian grocery store.

Christmas was the first time I had made the jelly myself and it was so good it’s worth sharing.

Pomegranate, apricot and coconut konnyaku jelly

One packet Happy Grass konnyaku jelly powder

1 litre water, plus another 100ml water

A handful of pomegranate seeds
2 tbs rice malt syrup

1 can coconut cream

1 can apricot nectar

The seeds of a vanilla bean (optional)

Boil the water. Put the packet of jelly powder in a pot and pour in the water, whisking to avoid lumps. Bring to a boil then turn the heat down to a simmer for three minutes, continuing to stir. Turn off the flame and stir in the malic acid sachet that comes with the powder.

Add the vanilla bean seeds and rice malt syrup, stir to combine, then separate the jelly into three portions. To the first portion add another 100ml of boiling water, stir well and pour enough into a metal bundt cake mould to fill the first third of the mould. Sprinkle the pomegranate seeds into it and set aside for 10 minutes. To the second portion add 150ml apricot nectar and heat gently, stirring, until the two liquids combine. Gently pour this layer over the first. To the third portion add 150 ml coconut cream, using the same approach, and add this layer to the mould. Refrigerate the jelly overnight to set fully.

To remove the jelly from the mould just push gently on each side of the jelly to release it, then flip the mould onto the plate and lift – the jelly should slide right out. I served it with extra pomegranate seeds.

I poured the excess jelly into small silicon chocolate moulds. These jellies could be pushed out of their moulds and eaten after just 10 minutes.