HFF 6.26: Party Time!

The Challenge: Party Time! Celebrate completing the challenge year by making a dish suitable for a party.

The Recipe: Lemon peel, to candy from The Cook's Own Book

Take some lemon peels, and clean them well from the pulp, and let them lay two days in salt and water; then scald and drain them dry; then boil them in a thin sirup till they look quite clear. After which take them out and have ready a thick sirup made with fine loaf sugar; put them into it and simmer them till the sugar-candies about the pan and peels. Then lay them separately on a hair sieve to drain strew sifted sugar over them and set them to dry in a slow oven.

[My favorite winter cakes all call for candied peel, so I'm counting it as a party recipe.]

The Date/Year and Region: 1832, Boston

 

How Did You Make It: I peeled four oranges and four small lemons; I don't remember the specific varieties, but the lemons were a thin-peel type, which wasn't ideal. Being somewhat pressed for time, I only soaked them in salt water for 24 hours; although the instructions don't say to keep the peels cool, I soaked them in a basin in the refrigerator, just to be on the safe side. The next day, I brought the salt water and peels to a boil, poured off the brine, and put the peel in a syrup of  (IIRC) 1 cup sugar to 2 cup water and boiled it again. After removing the peels, I made another syrup, in a proportion of 2 cups sugar to 1 cup water (ratio based on the 'sirup, to clarify' instructions in the same book), and boiled the peel for a third time. When it started getting thick and tacky, I fished out individual pieces of peel, rolled them in more sugar, and spread them on parchment paper on a baking sheet to cool/dry.

 

Time to Complete: A very long evening, and a few minutes prep the day before (really 2 days before).

 

Total Cost: About $5 for the fruit.

 

How Successful Was It?: The the orange peel tastes exactly like those orange-wedge jelly candies, down to the texture. It's uncanny, but also as far as I can tell, the way this is supposed to go. I only scorched a few pieces of peel in the process, so I'm calling it a win.

How Accurate Is It? Better than most of my early attempts where I was zesting the peel, and getting really hard, thin pieces as a result. I ended up guessing a bit on the sugar:water proportions in the syrup (and lost my notes from when I made this back in January before the official challenge window), so I'm not certain about the proportions on the thin syrup, other than that I know it was less than the 1 water : 2 sugar in the thick. Rolling the pieces in loose sugar isn't in the instructions, exactly, but I've found it helpful for keeping the peel from sticking to the parchment paper (or whatever you're drying it on).

Yes, I didn't delete the photo on accident. Like I did with my first write-up.