"If you hadn't lost all the sheep in the beautiful village of El Dorado, you wouldn't be here now eating candied cedars and pistachios". Voltaire wrote in his book Candide.
Ingredients and composition of candied fruit
How can we deny the charm of these candied citrus peels? Candied fruit for all seasons, from summer sorbets to winter panettone, from Val d'Aosta to Sicily... If you follow ours, you'll be able to make even the most skeptic eat them, try to believe!
Candying Fruit
It’s a method of preserving fruit by infusing them in sugar syrup. It takes 16 days, but the result is totally worth it. Water, sugar and fruit: these are the simple ingredients to start with. The pieces of fruit are first cooked in water and then immersed in the syrup made by the melting sugar which, once dry, gives lucidity and sweetness.
Step by step guide on how to prepare candied fruit
Start by taking some ripe, unspoiled fruit, wash it thoroughly and boil it for a few minutes. Then divide the types of fruit into bowls: the whole small ones, the big ones in pieces and those with hard skin pierced with a fork.
For every 1lb of raw weighed fruit you will need a syrup made with 7 oz of sugar and ½ US quart of water that will preserve it for a long time. Boil for 3 minutes and then pour the syrup over the fruit. Let it rest for 24 hours, then separate the syrup into a pot and add 2 ½ oz of sugar; bring to the boil and pour it back over the fruit. Repeat this operation for 7 days, then on the eighth day, put 3 oz of sugar and let the mixture rest for 48 hours. On the tenth day repeat the same operation and let it rest for another 4 days. Lastly cover the fruit and let it dry under a cloth, taking care that it doesn’t touch the fruit. What’s the secret? The raw material. To ensure the taste isn’t completely overpowered by the sugar infusion, the fruit should be at that magical moment when it’s perfectly ripe, when the aroma, texture and taste are at their best. Many on the other hand, make the mistake of using unripen fruit, easier and faster, without waste.
How to use candied fruits
Apricots, peaches, plums, pears and apples can be enjoyed whole or sliced: once you have followed all our tips step by step, you now just need to match them up with your favorite recipes for a typical dessert. Citrus fruit peels, such as oranges, tangerines and cedars, are also excellent as decorative elements on cakes, ice cream and traditional desserts, such as cannolo and colomba, or at the base of some first courses like rice. A very famous dessert made with rice and candied fruit is the rice all'Imperatrice, a delicious savarin cooked in milk with the addition of whipped cream.
Even the flowers lend themselves well to candying: try violets, rose petals and geranium; it’ll feel like spring has arrived!