Homemade Candied Peel

For all of us who love to bake,and have baked Christmas Cakes,Christmas goodies,fruit based items,fruit cakes and Christmas puddings,we all know the importance of the “fruit” in these delicious goodies!While a portion of the “fruit” is actually preserved fruit like Pineapple,Kiwi,Papaya,Banana and Maraschino Cherries,another big portion of the tasty “fruit” constitutes Candied Peel,which is an absolute must in traditional cakes and puddings!

So for nouveau bakers and people who are interested to start baking – What is candied Peel?”Candied” means coated with sugar and Peel is essentially the peels of all Citrus fruits.Oranges,Lemons,Limes,Grapefruit,Tangerines,Clementines – name all the varieties of Citrus and there we get the peels candied for including in those gorgeous Christmas Cakes we see online or have had during Christmas!The peels are thick and leathery and preparing them and sugar coating them and afterwards storing them for Christmas is an exciting process!We get the pride in saying that we prepared the cake from scratch with mostly all homemade ingredients!You will have to exclude the all purpose flour,sugar and baking powder as you will surely need to buy these (unless you have a flour mill and food industry on your name),but a majority of ingredients would be under your credit!

The Citrus fruits from which I took all the peels…

So to start with,I am posting pictures of all the fruits of which I included the peels of.You can buy whatever you get in your area.You can candy only one fruit peel or a medley of them – all upto your taste.Try to include a variety of Oranges as they will rock the recipe in which they are included!

1.Naval Oranges

2.Clementines

Please check the note on Clementines here

3.Lemons

4.Limes

5.Grapefruit

6.Kinnow (Indian cultivated Orange)

7.Nagpur Oranges

These were not available in the place where I stay!

It was a delicious medley of peels I candied and they are now stored in a glass bottle to mature till October when I will be steeping them in Rum before baking the Christmas Cake in December!

I had a total of 550 gms of peel and after the candying process they came up to 800 gms!Please measure the quantity of peel and sugar for best results.For 500 gms peel use 2 1/2 cups of sugar and water.I had 50 gms extra so that did not matter much as I had extra syrup left over after boiling with which I made a refreshing Citrus Squash/Concentrate.

You can check out the recipe here :

Preparation Time : 4 hours

Makes : 800 gms of Candied Peel

INGREDIENTS

Citrus Fruit :

5 Clementines

2 Naval Oranges

1 big Red Grapefruit

2 Lemons

2 Limes

Other ingredients :

Enough cold water to cover the peel

2 1/2 cups water

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar plus extra for sprinkling

METHOD

Score and peel all the fruits.Remove the excess of the white membrane from the undersides of the peels.Cut all the peels into strips and put into a pot or a saucepan.

Cover with enough cold water and place on medium heat.Bring to a boil.Drain the peels in a colander and put into the saucepan again.

Repeat the process twice more.Drain the peels and keep aside.

After the first draining..

After the third draining – peels look much brighter and would have lost almost 90% of their bitterness

Mix sugar and water in a saucepan and bring to a boil.Add the prepared peels and simmer for 1 1/2 hours.Drain and preserve the citrus syrup.

Put the peels on a wire rack to drain the extra syrup.Sprinkle with powdered sugar and leave to dry.

Draining the peels

The peels after drying for 2 days..

Store the prepared peels in an airtight glass container.Use as required.

Storing the peels in a glass container…