Bergamot Marmalade

Marmalade made from bergamot — the citrus that is grown almost nowhere else on earth but the Calabrian coast, and the one that gives Earl Grey tea its scent. If you know that perfume and have never eaten it, this is what it tastes like: floral, bitter, and far more aromatic than orange.

Bergamot is barely edible raw. It is too sour and too bitter, which is why almost all of the world's crop goes to the perfume and flavouring industries and only a fraction is ever preserved. Cooked with sugar, that same bitterness turns into the most complex marmalade there is.

• Italian bergamot marmalade
• Floral, bitter and intensely aromatic — not a sweet jam
• The citrus behind Earl Grey tea
• For toast, but also for cheese and for roast meat
• A rare preserve — most bergamot goes to perfumery

Where it shines. On buttered sourdough, obviously. But it earns its place on a cheese board, next to a fresh goat's cheese or an aged pecorino, where the bitterness cuts fat the way a chutney would. Stirred into plain yoghurt. Warmed and brushed over roast duck or pork. And a spoonful in a gin and tonic is not a joke — bergamot and juniper belong together.