Orangettes

Orangettes

6 large navel oranges

3 cups sugar

2 cups water

1/2 cup turbinado sugar

9 ounces of bittersweet chocolate (approximately)

It's best to take two days to make these peels. Prepare the peels and roll them in sugar the first day. Leave them overnight to dry well before dipping them in chocolate the next day.

Prepare peels: There are a couple of ways to peel these oranges to get the strips. Try both ways to see which works best for you.

Method #1: Cut ends off of oranges. With a sharp paring knife, score the entire length from cut end to cut end into strips. Set orange on cutting board and run your knife down between the white pith and the flesh of the orange. Turn orange over and do the same on the other side. Remove strips. Take the tip of the paring knife and remove any flesh and some of the pith from the strips.

Method #2: Cut ends off of oranges. With a sharp paring knife, score orange from cut end to cut end on opposite sides of orange. Insert knife between the white pith of the orange and the flesh of the orange and slice around the entire orange. Turn orange over and do this on the other side. Remove peel from flesh. Lay peel on cutting board and slice into strips. Remove any additional flesh from peels.

Take the flesh of the oranges and squeeze through strainer or juicer until you get 1 cup of orange juice. Set aside.

Blanch peels: Fill a medium sauce pan with water and bring to a boil. Add the orange peels and blanch for two minutes. Drain. Add fresh water and bring to a boil again. Plunge the peels back in and blanch them again for two minutes. Drain. Repeat process one more time.

In a medium sauce pan, bring the 3 cups of sugar, 2 cups of water and orange juice to a boil. Add orange peels and simmer on low for about one hour, uncovered. Drain the peels and roll in the turbinado sugar. Set sugared peel on a rack to dry overnight.

The next day, melt the chocolate and dip your candied orange peels. Lay on wax paper until they firm up. These keep in a covered plastic container for quite a while in the fridge. When they are cold, the chocolate may turn a little pale but if you bring them to room temperature, they darken up again.

The Italian Dish

theitaliandishblog.com