Orange You Glad I Made This?

Oranges Glacees - Glazed Oranges

There is the old saying, "Life's short, eat dessert first." This is a dessert that you could use and not feel too guilty about since it's fresh fruit! I decided, when I made the Boeuf Bourguignonne, that I would prepare an entire meal. According to me, it is not an "entire" meal unless it includes a dessert. Knowing that the other items I'd prepare would take a bit of time (you may recall that I didn't finish until 9:11pm) I searched Julia's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" to find a simple and quick dessert.

Hahahahahahahahaaaaaaaaheeeeheeeeeeee. Ooooooh, I crack me up. I, ummm, kind of forgot that "French" cooking has many ingredients and techniques but "simple" and "quick" are not included in the extensive list. Tasty, yes, but definitely not simple or quick for someone like me. This was also the first item I prepared on this adventure that actually resulted in my first major injury (teaser -- now you need to read on to find what I did to myself).

These glazed oranges were both scary and fun to make since they made me do a couple of things I'd never done before and they actually worked out! First, I needed to peel the oranges. How hard can that be? I love oranges and have peeled dozens and dozens over the years, probably even hundreds, but this was different -- I have never used a potato peeler to peel an orange before! I suppose that's how they do it in France? You can see in the photos at the end of this post that I ended up with a bunch of very thin strips of orange peel. Hmmmmm, it worked! The tedious part was having to cut those peels into a couple thousand (slight exaggeration) 1/8" strips when I was done. While I went onto the next steps, I let my two beautiful sous chefs (Elizabeth and Kathryn) assist by peeling the remaining white peeling from the oranges. I didn't really need the help but they were concerned that if I was any slower it would be time for breakfast when I finally finished.

While my assistants finished the peeling I started to make what seemed to be orange peel soup since I had to boil all the little strips of peel for about 10 minutes. The steam certainly made the kitchen smell nice and citrusy (is that a word). Say, isn't that another French word -- potpourri? Then another of those silly things Julia makes me do -- get something wet by boiling it and then dry everything off. Here's your investment tip of the day: while I'm on this adventure you might want to put some money into paper towel stock. While those were drying off I worked on the actual glaze.

I still can't believe how much sugar I used -- two cups of sugar for just 2/3 cup of water. That was a whole cereal bowl full of sugar! Wow! This didn't use any butter but it sure made up for it with sugar. The scary part was boiling the sugar/water mixture. Not just bringing it to a boil but letting it boil and boil and boil and boil... Did you know that the little popping sugar water bubbles spit out hot little droplets? By the way, those droplets did not cause my major injury.

Apparently, according to Elizabeth, I was doing the same process used to make candy. The instructions were to use a candy thermometer (really, I didn't have a grater and you think I'd have a candy thermometer?) or just test the doneness of the syrup by using the "firm ball" test. What in the world is the "firm ball" test? Thanks to Google and Elizabeth I learned that this is a candy making test where you drop some of the boiling sugar water into cold water and see if it forms a "firm ball." Who thinks of these things? So, while the sugar water continued to boil and spit flaming hot lava balls onto my hands, I kept taking little sample and dripping them into the water. Guess what happened?!?! After a while I dribbled some of the syrup into the cold water and it made a little blob that was gooey like soft carmel! Apparently that meant the syrup was at 244 degrees?

I then quickly stirred in my freshly dried orange peel strips and boiled the syrup/peel mixture for another minute. Then I used a large serving spoon to pour the syrup over the oranges that were spectacularly arranged in a serving bowl and it ended up looking just like the photo at the start of this post. Yep, that photo is what I made and not something I downloaded. The glaze completely covered the oranges and left them sitting in a little pool of that wonderful liquid. Did you notice what happened there? It was just "syrup" and the instant I poured it over the oranges it transformed into "glaze." How did it do that?

Once we finished our dinner we each enjoyed a wonderful glazed orange. It truly was a refreshingly light dessert that made a really nice end to our dinner. This is one of those things I'll end up making again some day.

Of course, the dessert would have been just a little better had I not been nursing my horrific wound. You see, I learned an important lesson after spooning the glaze onto the oranges. Remember, the "firm ball" test confirmed that the syrup was at 244 degrees? After spooning out all of the glaze there was a layer of it left in the bottom of the spoon. A good chef always taste tests their cooking, right? Yep, but not thinking about the temperature of this molten concoction I wiped a sample of the syrup from the bottom of the spoon with my finger fully intending to lick it off and taste it. Let's just say it didn't make it all the way to my tongue to taste since I'd ended up glazing my fingertip with this lava-like substance, Instead I quickly cooled my fingertip with cold water and even colder water (an ice cube) and had to endure the snickering of my to sous chefs. So remember, if you try this at home, keep your finger out of "firm ball" syrup unless it is already submerged in cold water. I quickly healed and even typing this doesn't hurt. Honesty is the best policy, it wasn't a horrific injury but it did hurt for a couple of hours and I still have a slighly reddish circle on my finger tip. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. This was just another lesson I needed to learn as I work on mastering the art of french cooking.

Go find yourself some oranges and make them even better with a nice little glaze!

Bon Appetit!